Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Uncovering the Evidence for Effective Practices Through Empirical Research 1581121288, 9781581121285

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Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Uncovering the evidence for effective practices through empirical research

by Terence John Cooke-Davies

ISBN: 1-58112-128-8

USA 2001

Towards Improved Project Ma~iageme~rt Practice: Ur~coveringthe evidence for eJfective practices through empirical researcli Copyright 82001 Terence John Cooke-Davies All rights reserved. Dissertation.com USA 2001 ISBN: 1-581 12-128-8

Uncovering the evidence fmeffective pl.actlcesthrough~irid~h

Terence John Cooke-Davies

A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment ofthe requirements of Leeds Metropolitan University for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy.

August 2000

Abstract Projects are important to industry. hut pmjeci performance continually disappoints stakeholder expectations. Organizations react to this performance problem in many ways, and purchase consultancy, training, methods and tools as possible solutions. Thcre is no published evidence that any of these solutions arc consistently successfi~lin improving project perfomlance. This thesis answers the question. "What can be done to improve projcct management practices, and thus project performance?': by demonstrating that a novel form of research can contribute such evidence.

success. A well-resourced support structure was established to administer the

programme. facilitate dialoguc, hold confidential data securely, and provide data analysis. Members provided data for the anonymous databases about their practices and about specific project results, and tirst-hand case studies for discussion at workshops. They discovered, shared and created both tacit and explicit knowledge through the fomial programme and through informal contact. Secondly, the thinking of practitioners, theorists and researchers was challenged. The literature on pmjoct management was found to reveal an unbalanced worldview that lacked coherent undcrlying theory. The literature on theory was found not to distinguish adequately between one-off "discrete" projects and the ongoing continuous operations of an organization. The academy's "paradigm wars" were found to have discouraged the creation of an appropriate research metliodology. Thirdly, different pieces of research using the community's data showed that some practices (notably aspects of risk management) lead to superior pcrfomiance independently of context, while others appear to be contextdependent. No companies were found to have all the answers, and each member of the community has been able to learn from others.

Dedication This work is dedicated to two remarkable women. Doreen, my wife, without whose constant support 1 would not have stayed tlie course, and Nora, my mother, who made great sacrifices to give nie the foundation of my education.

Table of Contents

Table of Contents 1.0 Thinking about projects and project management ............ 17 Summary..............................................................................................17

1.1 1.2

What projects are and what some key terms mean......................17

1.3

The importance of projects to industry

...........................................20

1.3.1

The conceptual basis to project management.................................

21

........23

IA

Project management in its social and economic environment

1.4.1 Projects in a pre- and proto-capitalist society (before c.1850). ..........24 1.4.2 The era of classic capitalism: project management from c.1850 to c.1950. ................................................................................................... 27 1.4.3 The era of "managerial capitalism": project management from c. 1950 29 to the mid-1980 1.4.4 The era of "intellectual capitalism": project management since the mid1980s. 32

.

1.5

.....

Project management today how industtythinks about projects 34 1.5.1 How project performance is measured in industry............................. 35 1.5.2 The need for improvement: why so many projects are seen to fail....38

........40 Conclusion........................................................................................... 40

Research questions that this thesis will attempt to answer

1.6 1.7

2.0 The worldview of the project manager 2.1

.

..........................43

Summary ..............................................................................................

43

2.2 Which practices have been correlated to project success and 44 project failure?

..............................................................................................

2.2.1 2.2.2 2.2.3 2.2.4

Baker. Murphy and Fisher 46 Pinto and Slevin ................................................................................ 46 Lechler ............................................................................................ 48 The implications of "critical success factors" .....................................50

...................50

2.3

What a worldview is and how it can be made visible

2.4

The project management "worldview"............................................ 52

2.4.1 "Praxis"- What a project manager does .................... . ................ 52 53 2.4.2 Salient elements of the "praxis" ......................................................... 2.4.3 Validation of the core "praxis" element 57 2.4.4 A review of the "praxis" elements ..................................................... 58 Summary of themes. topics and terms ......................................................59 Theme 1: Practices relating to the nature of the particular project ............60

Table of Contents

Theme 2 (Topic 6): Practices relating to the stages the project will need to pass through ............................................................................................. 72 Theme 3: Practices relating to "beneficial change" that the project is intended to accomplish ............................................................................. 73 Theme 4: Practices relating to the people that are associated with the enterprise..................................................................................................81

2.5

A systemic view of the project manager's worldview

2.5.1

...................90

Correlations of empirical research with the systemic worldview.........92

2.6 How can the search be conducted for improved project management practice? ................................................................................ 95

3.0

........................................................................................... 96 Research methods and underlying theory ..........................99

3.1

Summary

2.7

Conclusion

..............................................................................................99

3.2 Fundamental research issues of philosophy. knowledge. reality 0 0 and language

...............................................................................................

3.2.1 3.2.2 3.2.3

3.3

Preliminary considerations of philosophy ........................................102 What is golng on when people gain "knowledge"?........................... 104 Episternic Considerations ................................................................ 107

.......................... 112

Developing an appropriate research procedure

3.3.1

The role of Community in the Acquisition of Knowledge.................. 117

3.4

A new research methodology......................................................... 119

3.5

Conclusion

.......................................................................................125

4.0 Developing and applying fhe new tesearch model ..........127 4.1 4.2 4.3

.......................................................................................... 127 Three Cycles of Action Research ................................................... 128 The First Cycle of Action Research ................................................ 130 Summary

Step 1: Assemble the network ........................................................ 133 Step 2: Agree Topics ........................................................................ 133 Step 3: Write questions and scoring guidelines ................................133 Step4: Analyse data and publish report...........................................134 Step 5: Select topics for individual workshops ..................................134 Step 6: Hold interactive learning workshops .................................... 135 Step 7: Review the year's learning and consider a second cycle of activity ............................................................................................. 135 4.3.1 Experience gained in practice....................................................... 136 ................136 Assembling a netwo

Table of Contents Defining the programme of work ........................................................... 137 Identifying and gathering the data ...........................................................138 Sharing and learning from the information ...........................................138

4.4 The Second Cycle of Action Research: Challenging Perceptions..................................................................................................

140

Step 1: Hold SD modelling workshop................................................ 140 Steps 2 and 3: Develop project-level database structure and build project-level database Mk I.....................................................................141 Step 4: Populate database with 10 pilot projects ............................... 142 Collect additional project data............................................. 142 Step 5: Step 6: Analyse project-level data ..................................................... 142 Step 7: Workshops on specific topics ..............................................143

4.5

The Third Cycle of Action Research: Refining the Method

.......143

4.5.1 Developing the Mk II data collection instrument. and establishing the habit of continuous learning........................................................................ 145 4.5.3 Developing the Corporate Practice Questionnaire version 3 and an organisational project management maturity model....................................149

....150

4.6

Adding the Final Element: Interpretation and In-house Support.

4.7

C O ~ C ~ U SThe ~ OOrlgins ~ : ofthe Research Method in Three Cycles of

.................................................................................................151 5.0 What does the data show?.lllustrativeanalyses from two 155 data sets ........................................................................................

Development

5.1

Summary ............................................................................................ 155

5.2

How data are used by the networks............................................... 156

5.2.1 5.2.2 5.2.3

5.3

The Corporate Practice Questionnaire.......................................... 161

5.3.1 5.3.2 5.3.3

5.4

Applying the data in workshops ....................................................... 156 Building on the data in working parties ............................................158 Combining insights with fresh analysis...........................................159 How organisations use the CPQ .....................................................162 Illustrative results produced from the CPQ ...................................... 164 Individual company indications........................................................ 173

The data collection instrument (DCI) ............................................. 176

5.4.1 Project type and industry environment............................................177 5.4.2 Project results.................................................................................184 5.4.3 Strategic decisions..........................................................................189 5.4.4 Project management practices........................................................192 CHAD Analysis ...................................................................................... 194 Bivariate Correlations..............................................................................197

Table of Contents Further investigationof the correlations ............................................. 199 5.4.5 Conclusions about effective practices ........................................ 202 5.4.6 A "relative" spin-off from a "positivist" search .................................. 204

5.5

ConcluSion: The link between projed management practices and prolectperformance

6.2

....................................................................................... 206 Conclusions and further work to be done ......................... 209 Summary ............................................................................................ 209 Answers to the research questions............................................... 20!4

6.3

The contribution made by this research programme ................. 211

6.0 6.1

6.3.1 A researchdriven approach to project improvement.......................212 6.3.2 An innovative research method....................................................... 212 6.3.3 Enhancement of the project management worldview...................... 213 6.3.4 An international inter-company community of practice.................... 213 6.3.5 Specific results that pave the way for project management 213 benchmarking............................................................................................. 6.3.6 Locating projects in the context of strategic bus. improvement....... 214

6.4

....214

Developing benchmarking techniques for use with projects

6.4.1 Three difficulties to overcome ......................................................... 214 Few pmject management processes produce the project's primary product . . or service d~rectly ..................... . . ...... .........................................214 Different projects contain different profiles of risk ................................... 215 Projects are executed within differing organisational environments.........216 6.4.2 Two ways to progress towards a benchmarking capability ..............216 Incorporate existing performance data ................................................... 216 Extend the range of performance measures ......................................... 217

6.5

Improving comparability of data

..................................................... 218

Improved comparability for the CPQ .......................................................218 Improved data categories for the DCI............................................ 219

6.6

Applying systems thinking and system dynamics

......................219

6.6.1 Deepening understanding of the project management worldview ....220 220 The "people side" of project management............................................... 221 Benefits management ............................................................................. Understanding project strategies ............................................................. 222 6.6.2 Developing a predictive model ..................................................223 Developing a new research instrument ................................................. 223 Developing a Wight simulator" ................................................................. 225

6.7

Conclusion

.........................................................................................225

Reference List .............................................................................................

227

Table of Contents Appendix I: Portrait Appendix II: Landscape

Table of Contents

List of Figures and Tables Figure 1: Where projects fit into the spectrum of work ................................... 19 Figure 2: The context for projects.....................................................................22 Figure 3: Different types of project metric ......................................................... 37

.

.

Figure 4: Pinto & Slevin's Model of Project Success. (Pinto and Slevin 1988b p. 69) ................................................................................................................ 47 Figure 5: Lechler's Causal Analysis .............................................................. 49 Figure 6: Systemic relationships in the pmject manager's worldview................ 90 Figure 7: Gaps in the systemic worldview ........................................................ 91

.

Figure 8: First- and second-order cybernetics (Schwaninger 1997).................92

.

Figure 9: A framework based on Habermas' three worlds Adopted from Mingers. 1997.................................................................................................. 101 Figure 10: Research methods and underlying paradigms..............................104 Figure 11: The classic shape of single-paradigm research............................ 119 Figure 12: The concept of a continuous research methodology.....................120 Figure 13: The Benchmarking Process .......................................................... 130 Figure 14: The First Cycle of Action Research ............................................... 132 Figure 15: The Second Cycle of Action Researc Figure 16: The First Structure of a Pmjects Database .................................

140 141

Figure 17: The Third Cycle of Action Research............................................ 145 Figure 18: The Second Pmject Database Structure ....................................... 146 Figure 19: Structure of Project Analysis .......................................................... 148 Figure 20: The Third Structure of the Project Database .................................148 Figure 21: Two Levels of Capability ...............................................................149 Figure 22: The Seven Components of the Research Method .........................152 Figure 23: Transferring 'lessons learned' from project to pmject ..................... 158 Figure 24: Pmject start-up and Post Project Reviews .....................................160 Figure 25: Range of appmach scores.............................................................166 Figure 26: Range of deployment scores.........................................................167 Figure 27: Range of appmach scores by perspective....................................168 Figure 28: Comparison of CPQ deployment scores over time.........................169 Figure 29: CPQ Scores for Topic 1: Integration ............................................ 171 Figure 30: Individual Company CPQ Scores .................................................. 174 Figure 31: CPQ scores for topicI..................................................................174 Figure 32: CPQ scores for topic l a compared across three networks............ 175

Table of Contents Figure 33: CPQ Scores for individual questions.............................................176 Figure 34: Project cost categories across industries....................................... 178 Figure 35: Types of project undertaken by industry........................................179 Figure 36: Number of projects in each life cycle phase...................................181 Figure 37:Percentage of cost categories for each type of project ................... 182 Figure 38:Duration of projects within each type............................................

183

Figure 39:Project cost (f'000)and project duration (weeks) ...........................184 Figure 40:Relationship between time and cost predictability.......................... 187 Figure 41:Relationship between cost and scope predictability.......................188 Figure 42: Types of project strategy...............................................................191 Figure 43: CHAD analysis. showing practices influencing time predictability.. 195 Figure 44: Practices correlating to cost predictability ...................................... 196 Figure 45:Influence of company-wide risk education on time predictability.....199 Figure 46:Effect of assigning risk owners on time predictability ..................... 201 Figure 47: Comparison of relative cost & time predictability by company........ 204 Figure 48: Variability of Mean Risk Management Adequacy between 206 Companies..................................................................................................... Figure 49:Benefits management and the relationship between projects and operations...................................................................................................... 221 Figure 50:How practices relate to performance..............................................224

Summary

Summary of Thesis This thesis describes a programme of continuous action research, involving an international network of major organisations to which projects are important. The research concerns the development of methodology and content to build this nchvork into a learning community for project improvement. The research started with six quite basic questions about project management practices but it has led to significant developments in: -.

A research-driven approach to project improvement. An innovative research method. Enhancement of the existing project management worldview. A growing international network of project-based organisations. Specific results that pave the way for project management benchmarking. A means of relating project performance to business improvement. Thc thesis contains six Chapters. Chapter 1 describcs what projects are and the role they play in business, and explains why the research qucstions arc important. Chapter 2 reviews the corpus of project management literature, and extracts an account of the way a project manager views the world. This view is consolidatcd into eleven topics and given a form and substance that shows how they inter-relate. Comparison with prior empirical research identifies a number of gaps. Chapter 3 considers the epistemic foundations for a research method that has seven explicit components, making allowance for the fact that neither a pure positivist nor a pure constructivist philosophy provides a sufficiently rich basis to research into project management. Chapter 4 traces the historical development of the seven components of the research method, and summarises the answers to three of the research questions. Chapter 5 illustrates the results obtained from data analysis, answering a fi~rtliertwo research questions by describing both observed variations in project perforn~ance,and practices that partially account for these.

Summary Chapter 6 summarises the contribution made by the research programme, and lists the current plans for further work.

Contributions

Contributions In the course of this research, hvo things have been happening in parallel. One has been the commercial creation and support of a network of major organisations to improve project management practice. The other has been tlie developnient of research in terms of both niethodology and content, which has transformed that network into a learning community. It is this research, quite separate from the commercial activities, that is submitted for the degree. The original research concept came to me during 1993, at a time when I saw many organisations making far-reaching decisions about their project management practices with very little evidence to support them. I was driven by the desire that decisions should be based on the foundations of solid evidence, and to create a method for obtaining that evidence. My personal contributions to the programme have been in:-

*

Developing the conceptual design of the study, including the overall process steps and the epistemic underpinnings described in Chapter 3, the method of choice that was used for significant decisions, the structure of all workshops involving network members during the tirst few years, the structure of all analysis carried out and reports issued, and the conimercial relationships between network members and Human Systems Limited. Developing the analytical framework and performing analysis on the data, as well as directing additional analysis from time to time from members of Human Systems working under my instructions. Formulating theories that have guided each stage of thc work. Assembling and maintaining the networks, or ensuring that suitahly qr~alificdmcmbers of the Human Systems teani working under my instructions, assemble and maintain thc networks. Facilitating the dialogue that results in agreement on the information to be collected from the networks and tlie fonn that it will take, and obtaining agreement for this from network members. Ensuring that data is collected, and assuring its quality. Facilitating the discussion between network members and members of the Human Systems team that result from the announcement of

Contributions

insights arising from the analysis, and the framing of more detailed research questions as a result of these discussions. Writing all research proposals and submissions, including the whole text of this thesis. Clearly I could not have done this work without the support of many people, and I wish to acknowledge the assistancc received from the following. Throughout the programme, 1 have received the financial and practical support of Human Systems Limited, the company of which I am Managing Director. My colleagues at Human Systems Limited have each been involved in different aspects of the programme. John Gandcc, one of the first people to be approached at ICL when the idea of forming the community was first mooted in 1993, has been continually involved. From the output of the initial workshops he wrote the first version of the corporate practice questionnaire, he has attended each of the workshops for and performed much of the managcrnent activity involved in supporting and administering the work of the first two networks, and more recently he has produced the Foxpro version of the corporate practice questionnaire and its derivatives, and has overseen and augmented development of the commercial Access version of the DCI. John facilitated the first working party on "learning lessons on projects". Brian Trelty, the first representative of Wellconie in the first network, has subsequently been a stalwart member of the Human Systems team. It was largely through Brian's effort that the joint venture with CMR International came about that has resulted in the creation of two global pharmaceutical networks. Apart from leading that effort, Brian has workcd closely with John Gandee in the creation and support of Europe 2, the second network to be created. He has facilitated working parties on "real risk management" and "implementing process improvements". Alan Cumberland, a fellow Director of Human Systems Limited has continually supported the venture, and played a significant part in decisions about the management of the commercial aspects of the programme. Alan has facilitated several of thc network's workshops, and the working party on "measuring project performance". Jean Adams, Matthew Nixon and Debbie Garrett have also provided generous and professional support to the activities, in addition to which

Contributions Jean very kindly assisted with the unenviable task of proof reading this text. As the networks took on an international aspect, Lynn Crawford, Frank Davies, Chivonne Watts and Andrew Durbridge headed the effort to create co~nmercial networks and to apply the research method in Australia, and did an excellent job in recruiting thirty additional organisations. Lynn has provided valuable encouragement and support to me and to the Hunian Systems team, and Frank has been tireless in his professional efforts to assemble and support the Australian community, and to manage the network activities based in Sydney. As the programme rolls out to USA, Dalton Weekley, Peter Rogers and Steve Neuendorf of CCG LLC have become joint venture partners, and Steve has contributed the excellent Excel spreadsheets that enrich the presentation of relative data to members of all current networks. The programme has been built around a "conimunity of practice", and it would not have been possible without the active participation and support of the representatives of the many organisations that have been member., of the networks since their inception at the beginning of 1994. They have been generous in their provision of time. data. knowlcdgc, expertise, resources and support. It is wrong to single out some more than others for mention by name, since many have made invaluable contributions, and 1 would like to acknowledge every one of them. It would equally be wrong, however, to fail to acknowledge the special contribution made by two people. In the early days of creating the first network, Steve Grey of ICL worked tirelessly with me to assemble the first community of practice, and to refine the proposal that was put to Without Steve's help, I doubt that the prospective members. programme would have got off the ground. Paul Armstrong and his team at BT Group Projects have also made a unique contribution. Not only has Paul been continually associated with this activity as BT's representative since the formation of the first network, but in the development of the data collection instrument, Paul and his team took the lead in developing the prototype Microsoft Access application, that was subsequently refined by conlmercial software developers into the instrument that it now is. Finally, I would like to express my heartfelt appreciation for the unstinting guidance, encouragement and support of my supervisor, Professor Eric Wolstenholme.

Contributions

ConJidentiality There is a commcrcial nccd to protect the confidentiality of information provided by members of the networks. For this reason, the data and other material included in the thesis have been presented in such a way as to protect the interests of the network members after this thesis has been published. Tcrry Cooke-Davies. August 2000.

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 1

Chapter 1: 1: Thinking about projects and project management. 1.1

Summary.

The term "project" is used widely and in a variety of contexts, and a tcchnical vocabulary has grown up to describe different aspects of projects. Industry throughout the world today uses the concept of a "project" to talk about particular kinds of work (generally unique, selfcontained pieces of work that are intended to create a product or service that will lead to beneficial change), and this kind of work is of grcat economic and social importance. The development of the concepts and language about prqiects is considered briefly in relation to its social and economic environment throughout history and in the present day, before the present worldview held by private sector commercial and industrial organisations is sketched out in relation to projects. The question of how these organisations measure the performance of projects is introduced, and it ic shown that there is a widespread perception that many projects "fail". The social and economic cost of this failure is reviewed.

The literature of project management offers a variety of definitions, which have classically included the three characteristics of a cominon objective, a set of activities that arc complcx enough to need managing. and a defined start and finish time.

A coniplex eflort to achieve a spectfic ohjertive within a srhedttb and budget target, which &vically cuts aclasr organisational lines, is tmiqtre, and i~ustrally not repetitive within the or-ganisntion. (Cleland and King, 1983, p. 70) More recently, definitions have been modified to reflect the existence of a "product" or "scrvice" that the project creates.

Towards lrnpmved Project Management Practice: Chapter I

1A temporary etzdeovour undertaken to create a unique product or

& serwce. Temporary means that tlze project ltas a definite ending point, e4

I

and tcnique means Rat the prod~tctor service differs in some $$ distinguishing way fi-orn all similar prodtrcts or services. (Duncan, . :1996, p. 4.) $2 Rodney Turncr dcvclops this theme even further, by including the concept of the "beneficial change" that the product of the projcct is supposed to deliver.

f5 .

1

An endeavour in ~:hicRIzunzan, nzatericrl nnd.finatzcia1 resources are organised in a novel wcly, to un~lertukea ztnique scope of wjork, of given .specification, within constraitits of cost and tinze, so as to achieve beneficial change defined by qtlantitative and qrralitative objectives. (Trrtzer, 1993, p. 8.) One in particular, however, illustratcs just how widely the term "project" can be applied in common parlance:-

Any plan, scheme or task - inclttding the writing of this book - can be and i r refired e as a '@oject9'. ( S t a l l + ~ ~ nand h y Kharbanda, 198.7, $jPreface.) In order to providc appropriate boundaries for the definition of what a projcct is, it is perhaps appropriate to approach the topic from the othcr end, as it were, and ask the question, "What kinds of cndeavour cannot legitimately be regarded as projects?" That yields very different answers, and i n practice, they seem to boil down to four different categories:. 1.

2.

3.

Sets of activities that are reoeated indefinitely, such as the continuous operations of a process plant. These are perhaps more usefully thought of as "processes". Sets of activities that are repeated in a oredictable manner, such as batch manufacturing, the raising of invoices, or the conduct of annual appraisals. These can be thought of as processes, but can equally well be thought of as "operations" in the business context.' Sets of activities that may well include projects, but which are sufficiently large and complcx and have sufficient flexibilitv about

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 1

4.

their start and finish that they are better thought of as "pr.ogrammesn. Activities that are so brief, so simple or so straightforward that they rcauire no sieniticant management effort, and that can better be thought of as tasks or actitsities.

Figure I illustrates the relationships of these different clcmcnts.

Figure I : Wherpprojects,/itinto the sl>ectrumofwork.

It seems clear that there is no chance of reaching universal agreement on a single definition of a prqject. but it is important to be clear about thc meaning of a word that is so central to this piece of research. The stance taken in this research, therefore. is to adopt a pragmatic approach and recognise that thinking about an cndcavour as a "pro.jectW is a matter of choice for any organisation or individual. Adding this recognition to the classical definition, and the concepts included by Duncan and Turner, the definition of a project used throughout this work is:

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter I "A human endeavour may legitimately be regarded by its stakeholders a s a project when it encompasses a unique scope of work that is constrained by cost and time, the purpose of which is to create or modify a product or sewice s o a s to achieve beneficial change defined by quantitative and qualitative objectives."

This research .programme has been undertaken in order to identify how the performance of projects can be improved through the identification and understanding of those project management practices that lead to superior performance. It is essential to understand what is meant by several terms that will be used throughout this document, and in particular to distinguish what project management is taken to mean and what it isn't. Thrcc conccpts lie at the heart: a)

b)

c)

The product or sewice that will be brought into existence or modified through the agency of the "project", and that will remain after the project has been completed will be referred to throughout this text as the PRODUCT of the project. This applies to any or all of the purposes of projects described above. The series of activities carried out by people or their agents directly to create or to modify the product will be referred to throughout this text as PROJECT EXECUTION activities. The series of activities cam'ed out by people or their agcnts to initiate, plan, control and terminate the projcct execution activities will be referred to throughout this text as the PROJECT MANAGEMENT activities.

The distinction between project execution and project management is not always a neat and clear one. For example a meeting of site personnel in a construction projcct might be considered to fall into either or both of these categories. Nevertheless, the distinction remains broadly valid, and presents special problems for the use of techniques such as benchmarking for the assessment of project management efficiency or effectiveness (see Chapter 4).

1.3

The importance of projects to industry.

In business and commerce, projects represent a substantial proportion of the productive effort of enterprises in every industrial scctor. A "straw poll" of fifteen enterprises recently estimated conservatively that their combined annual spend on projects exceeds f 15bn.l The range of

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 1 products that are created or modified by projects gives some indication of the extent and value of project work to industry, and of the beneficial change that projects achieve. New facilities are produced - factories. offices. plants or pieces of infrastructure. These are then operated for economic advantagc. New products are designed or developed for manufacture in ongoing operations or for use to generate wealth in some other way. Services are delivered, such as the refit of a ship, the renovation of a building or the conduct of a piece of research. Changes are engineered to business systems and to organisation stnlcturcs, so that enterprises can be operated more efficiently. It is no exaggeration to say that projects lie at the heart of human economic activity, and it follows that any improvements that can be made to the practice of managing projects will have a significant cffcct of the output of all wealth creation in advanced industrial or postindustrial societies.

1.3.1

The conceptual basis to project management.

Very few of the published works on project management make explicit thc philosophical approach that underscores their work. Most writers seem to imply that some form of empirical realism is possible. Some descrihe project management as a science or suggest that it uses "scientific" techniques, as for cxample Kharbanda, Stallworthy and Willianls (1980) who define cost eneineerine as "that arca of engineering principles where engineering juclgement and experience are of scientific principles and techniques to utilised in the application .. problems of cost estimation, cost control. business planning and management science." (p. 5)

-

-

Morris (1 994) states that "there is not yet an adequate conceptual basis to the discipline [of project management]", and concludes that "the current fonnal view of, and indeed practices of, project management are oAen inadequate to the task of managing projccts successfully: and that wc would do better to enlarge the subject to the broader one of thc 'managenlent of proiects"' by including topics such as "design and technology management, thc management of political forces (governmental and non-governmental, and 'political with a small p' -

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter I business, labour and community), cost-benefit management and the raising and management of the project's finance, the management of the timing or phasing of the project (something quite differcnt, incidentally, from the theory and practice of project scheduling), and even contract strategy and administration." (p. 2)

I

create.

i

m r m t c r r ror

/

SYSTEM BOUNDARY

Figure 2: The conlerlfor projects.

One way to provide a framework for an "adcquate" conceptual basis is to recognise the dynamic linkages that exist between an enterprise, the projects it undertakes, the practices and techniques it employs, and the products or services that are created or modified by the projects (See Figure 2 above). To include the full range of topics that Morris believes to have an influence on the performance of projects, however, it is also necessary to recognise that this activity takes place within a social and economic environment that creates the context for enterprises, that itself is changed by the products or services created by projects, and that exerts a strong cultural and technical influence on the practices and techniques employed in the management of projects.

I

Towards Impmved Project Management Practice: Chapter 1 A second way in which this research will seek to add to the conceptual

basis to project management is by seeking to bridge the gap between "academic knowledge" and "industrial practice". As one leading management thinker has expressed it: -

Specialiratron is herorning an ohstack to tlie acqvisition o f knon,led~e and an even greater harrier to making it efectiije Acadernia defines knowledge ar w,l7at getsprinted. But %rely this is not knoit~ledge:it is raw data. Knowledge is information that r1tange.s sorttethlrtg or. sonlebody - either /?JI becon~ingground7 for nctiori, or b j ~making an indlc7idual (or an invtifution) capable oftnore efrectii action . . . Wlio or what is to blamefir the obscurantism ofthe learned is heside the point. What matters is that the learning of the academic specialist is rapidly ceasing to be "knowledge". It r p at itr hert "erztdition" and at its more conimon worst mere "data". (Dr~~cker, 1989: 251 - 252)

Although this work is not about the history of projects, modcrn project management is built on foundations nearly as old as civilisation itself. Key concepts that are still used today have emerged from the very different social and economic environments of different historical times, and have become part of today's "accepted wisdom" of projcct management. A brief review is appropriate of how these key concepts and "tools" arose within their social context (see Table 1). so that the contribution of each of them to project management practice can be examined. In later Chapters serious questions will be asked about the effectiveness of each of them, and their relevance to today's business environment. There have been a number of attempts to summarise the history of projects, and the introduction to many books on project management contains its own brief summary. The one that has exerted the greatest influence on this work is that by Morris (1 994). although the four broad periods that will be considered below. along with the proiect management legacy from each of them, are not those used by him.

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 1

1.4.1

Projects in a pre- and proto-capitalist society (before c.1850).

Writers on the subject of project management are agreed that activities that could be described as "project management" date back to very early tinies in the history of civilisation. "Projects have been part of the human scene since civilisation started." (Lock, 1987) "Managing projects is one of the oldest and most respected accomplislinients of mankind. We stand in awe of the achievements of the builders of the pyramids, the architccts of ancient cities, the masons and craftsmen of great cathedrals and mosques; of the might and labour behind the Grcat Wall of China and other wonders ofthe world." (Moms, 1994, p. 1 .) One characteristic of these very early projccts was the use of huge amount of manpower in what would today be called "the construction phase", and this "workforce" appears to have been organised in a way that reflected the social constructs of the culture in which the projects were taking place. Many early edifices had a religious connotation, and some (e.g. Stonclicngc) rnay well have included large elements of voluntary labour. Others, such as the pyramids of Egypt, made usc of large quantities of slave labour under the oversight of an architect. The subdivision of manpower into smallcr units for the purposes of oversight appears to have been well established in the ancient world. The first recorded reference to a supervisor dates from c.1750 B.C. (Wren, 1994). The term is frequently used in connection with the Egyptian "rule of ten" (whereby one supervisor is placed in charge of ten slaves or workmen) and an early text from the ~ i b l (dating e~ from perhaps 650 B.C. and referring to some 500 years earlier) illustrates the principle of establishing a management hierarchy with a reasonable span of control. This has been one of the most enduring management principles. and has been applied in both military and civil life right down to the present day. In addition to the labour element, the role of "contracts" was also important. Nearly all these early construction projccts were let under contract to a single "contractor", who in turn would often let "subcontracts" for various elements of the work. "The Long Walls in Athens, for example, were managed as a whole by tlic architect Callicrates, with the work let to ten contractors; the Colosseum was built by four contractors." (Morris, 1994, p. 4.). Even where the

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 1

"contract" was less formal, a Pharaoh such as Rameses I I (c. 1270 B.C.) would contract the oversight of his major building works to his vizier and Royal Architect Rahotep. (Rohl, 1995) Throughout the era of Classical Greece and Rome and continuously through the growth and domination of the Christian Church, projects continued to he undertaken to construct thc grcat "public works" required by society. As first the enlightenment, and then industrialisation began to mould the social context, and industrial and commercial enterprises began to act as agents for society at large, thc number of projects, and the fields of human endeavour within which they were undertaken began to proliferate. The predominant context, however, within which projects were undertaken remained the areas of building and civil engineering, with a dominant format comprising "the professional designer 'representing' the owner's interests in preparing a design and awartling and administering the contract between the huilder and the owner." (Morris, 1994, p. 6.)

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 1

ISocial Environment

I

I Emergent concepts

I . Projects in a prc- and protocapitalist society. (before c.lX50).

a) Mobilisation and management hierarchy. b) Client-contractor relationship

2. Projects and project managcment in a world dominated economically by 'klassic capitalism". (c.1850 to c.1950) Evolution of formal techniques.

C) Management disciplines d) Project planning tcchniques. e) Logistics planning. f) Work breakdown structure. g) Time-driven research.

3. Projects and project

management during the era of "managerial capitalism". (c.1950 to mid-1 980s) Birth of a profession. Widespread adoption of projcct management hy the engineering and construction industries in the 1970s. Early application of project management techniques in other industries such as IT and Entertainment. Thc expansion of project management from "traditional" environments into stratepic business management and IT during the 1980s.

1

-

4. Projects and projcct management during an age of "intellectual capitalism". (mid- 1980s and beyond). Project management as a "core business discipline": The current trend towards the "project-based organisation" and "management by proiects". ..

h) Systcms management. i) Scheduling techniques. j) Procurement management. k) Performance measurenient (Earned Value Analysis). I) Programme management. ni) Project management professional societies. n) Project matrix organisations. o) Refinement of defence development lifc-cyclcs. p) Widespread acceptance of project management practices. q) New forms of contract - BOO Macro-technology programmes. s) Application of project management to IT projects. t) Systcms engineering and software project management. U) Business pmcess re-engineering. v) Pro.ject-based organisations. w) New contract philosophies (Pamering, Alliancing). x) Attempts to apply "Benchmarking" techniques to projects

I

Fable I : Or~grnsof elements present rn currentprojert rnunagement practice.

I

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 1

1.4.2

The era of classic capitalism: project management from c.1850 to c.1950.

By the beginning of the twentieth century, the shape of modern economic activity was in full swing in many Western countries, with engineerimg and cotistn~ctionprojects making a major impact on the environment. Unlike earlier periods, however, at least three characteristics marked the social environment for projects during this period: 1.

2.

3.

The existence of a market economy. in which commercial motives dominated the thoughts of both the owner (si~clias the Great Western Railway company) and the professional designer (such as Brunel). Massive increases in the rate of tcchnological development, and, with it, the establishment of a physical infrastructure that increased both the opportunities for and the complexity of project management. The parallel development of management theory and practicc as the search for industrial efficiency gathered pace.

Technological developments such as the railway, the motor car and the wireless telegraph played their part in shaping both opportunities for and the coniplexities of project management, and the products created by projects themselves helped to develop the infrastructure within which the projects themselves were carried out. The pressure of market forces led to pioneering work by such management thinkers as Henri Fayol and Frederick Taylor which laid the foundations for much modcm management practice. Fayol's principles and elements of management (Fayol, 1949), and Taylor's Scientific Management (Wrege and Greenwood. 199 1) both had a great influence, the former on the "art" of management and the latter on the development of "scientific techniques". Not only did many of the thought constructs emerge that underpin modeni nianagcrncnt practice (it is not uncommon to find text books published since 1990 that still enumerate Fayol's five elements of management - planning, resourcing, commanding. co-ordinating and controlling - as the basic tasks of management) but under these compelling economic conditions, engineers such' as Henry Gantt

27

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter I developed tools that allow project work to be better planned. The eponymous Gantt chart is probably still the most widely used management tool today for communicating a project schedule. The Second World War and its immediate aftermath brought the classical era to a close. The planning of military operations bears more than a slight rcscmblance to the planning of projects, but the only real advance that the military in World War I1 can claim to have made to the practices of project management is in the increasing sophisticated planning of logistics (getting the right rcsources to the right place at the right time and in a fonn where they are useful). Perhaps the most significant legacy of the Second World War was in the developments associated with the conduct of major technological research against tight timescales, culminating with the Manhattan Project (the USA's dcvclopment of the atomic bomb). The characteristics of this massive undertaking (involving over 600,000 people and costing over $2bn) were urgency and tcchnical uncertainty, combined with the need to co-ordinate a wide range of activities in multiple locations. The person in charge of the Manhattan Project was General Leslie M. Groves, and he attributes the success of the projcct to five factors. Firstly we had a clearly defined, unmistakable, specific objective.... Second each part of the project had a specific task. These tasks were carefully allocated and supervised so that the sum of their parts would result In the overall accornplishnzent of our overall mission ... Third, there was po~itive,clear-cut, unquestioned direction of the project at all levels. Authority was invariably delegated with responsrhility, and this delegation MJQS absoltite and without reservation.... Fortrth, the project made ma.nmimm use of already existing agencies, facilities and services... Consequently, our people were able to devote them~elves exclusively to the task at hand, and had no reason to engage in independent empire building. FIftItlv, andfinally, we had the full backing of otir governrnent with the nearly infinite [availability of resources]. {Morris, 1994, p. 17.) Although much of this makes use of management principles developed during the era as a whole, the combination of factors quotcd by Groves

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 1 describes the principles on which the more recent practice of employing a "Work Breakdown Structure" is based.

1.4.3

4

The era of "managerial capitalismw : project management from c. 1950 to the mid-1980s.

The prolonged period of post-war development, and its transition into the modcrn "information society" has been referred to as the period of "managerial capitalism" because it is marked by a growing separation of business ownership from management. with professional managers increasingly dictating the practices and the focus of business enterprises. For project management it was a heady period seeing the birth of a profession (that of project manager), tlie widcspread adoption of project management principles and practices by tlie engineering and construction industries during the 1970s, the early application of prqiect management techniques to other industries such as IT, Entertainment and Services, and finally during the 1980s the wholesale expansion of project management from its "traditional" environments into the mainstream of business management and IT. Thc first decade of the period saw the introduction and development of "Systems Management" - the "elaboration of the specification for the tcchnical, organisational, cost, time and other parameters of a system (and hence its subsidiary programmes and projects) and the subsequent management of the planning, designiengineering, procurement, implementation and testing of the work needcd to realise thc system concept." (APM, 1995, p. 9.). Growing through USAF procurement activities, it took root in the Atlas and tlie Polaris missile programmes. In the course of the last-named of these three, one of the most visible and (at least in its derivatives) widespread techniques of project management was developed. PERT (Program Evaluation and Review technique) combined the concept of linking activities together in a network that showed their logical dependencies, the combination of estiniates of the likely duration of activities from bench engineers using a mathematical formula for determining the expected time of achieving a particular event, and the identification of the 'critical path', i.e. the sequence of activities in a project that requires the longest timc for completion. (Morris, 1994).

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter I At the same time as the US defence industry was leading the way in the dcvclopment of Systems Management and PERT, construction industries on both sides of the Atlantic began to apply the principles of Work Study and Operational Research to recurrent projects such as plant maintenance or plant shut-down. From this work, most influentially through Du Pont, an alternative set of tools emerged, known collectively as CPM (Critical Path Method). There are many similarities between the two approaches, and both use a form of network diagram in which activities are represented by arrows with the logical dependencies of one activity upon another shown by the relationships between the arrows. On the other hand, there are also diffcrenccs since CPM (which deals with activities whose duration can be estimated more predictably that the R&D environment of PERT) emphasises cost and resource allocation as well as schcdulc, whereas PERT is more concerned with predicting thc likely duration of an uncertain project. These developments gave rise to the article that classically defined the role of the project manager (Gaddis, 1959). In it Gaddis pulled together some of the concepts that still lie at the centre of project management: the primacy of objectives, the need for organisation, the unique characteristics that distinguish projects, the unique functions of a project manager - "the man in between management and the tcchno1ogist"- and the necessary qualifications for success. As the 1950s gave way to the 1960s and project-based activity increased not only in the defence and construction industries but also in the emergent world of computer, a second family of techniques grew to rival the PERTICPM approach. Originating with Professor B. Roy's "Method of Potentials" in France (Roy, 1962) but described as a generic approach by Joseph Moder and Cecil Phillips (Moder and Phillips, 1964), this method differs from PERTICPM in that it represents each activity by a box rather than an arrow, and then links the activities together by means of arrows. This allows the concept of "lag" to bc used, showing the extent by which one activity lags behind another. Although it was slow to spread, this family of methods is now more widespread in common use than PERTICPM. During the early 1960s a study published jointly by the Department of Defence and NASA (DoD and NASA Guide, 1962) not only emphasised the need to include cost control aspects in PERT, but also

Towards Improved Projecf Management Practice: Chapter 1

introduced the formal adoption of Work Breakdown Structure as a tool for project a t ~ dprogramme management. Shortly afterwards, the USAF specified that a specific form of PERT/Cost planning should be used. that related the physical progress of the project to thc development of both schedule and cost. This technique, known as Earned Value, was a specific form of performance measurement that is now in widespread use in traditional environments for project management. The 1960s (although not only the 1960s) were characterised by major cost and schedule overruns on high-visibility projects, with notorious examples such as the TSR2 project in UK leading to, on the one hand, a focits on the acquisition process in general and alternative forms of contract in particular, and, on the other hand, to a broadening of the application of project nianagcmcnt into wider areas than the aerospace, defence and construction industries that had provided its development environment. Organisation theory, meanwhile, was developitig in parallel, and by the end of the 1960s there was not only a recognition of the need for project management as a discipline in its own right, but also the creation of the two major professional bodies for project managers, PMI (tlie Project Management Institute) in USA and IPMA (tlie international Project Management Association, formerly known as Internet) internationally, with its constituent national bodies such as APM (the Association for Project Management) in UK. As organisation theory and project management met, the concepts of matrix organisations developed as applied to pro.jects/functions, with some recognition that the nature of a project manager's job wodd vary depending upon where along the spectrum from functional organisation through matrix to project organisation the enterprise chose to structure itself. During tlie 1970s project management continued to spread thro~~ghout the traditional industries, with a specific impetus coming from the rise in the oil price from $3 per barrel to $12, with tlie consequent change in attractiveness of production from areas such as the North Sea. where the first discoveries in 1969 to 1971 werc followed by an investment of over f60bn in oil and gas exploratioti and production facilities. This spawned the development of new methods of financing projects, with

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 1 funds being raised for specific projects themselves rather than for the enterprise that is commissioning the project. The 1980s saw a notable change in the political and economic environment on both sides of the Atlantic, and for the first time since the ancicnt world, a fundamental reconsideration of the roles of "owner" and "builder" through the introduction of BOO (T) contracts (Build, Own, Operate and Transfer) such as the Channel Tunnel and the Dartford Crossing. The introduction of thc IBM PC in 1982 also ensured that the role of 1T in any business enterprise would be fundamentally transformed during the 19XOs, and huge amounts of money were spent on managing international, national and enterprise-wide IT projects.

1.4.4

The era of "intellectual capitalism": project management since the mid-1980s.

The social and economic climate at the cnd of the second millennium is presenting enterpriscs with a fresh set of challenges, many of which are having an effect on the nature of projects that are undertaken, and on the project management practices that they employ. The development of global competition, for example, is resulting in major projects requiring the co-ordination o r suppliers from different enterprises, based in different countries, with different languages and divcrgcnt cultures. Thc dcvclopment of a global IT infrastructure is not only creating opportunities for many projects with a high IT content and with a business re-engineering focus, but is also changing the fundamecital patterns of work within enterprises and within project teams. The growth of service industries is increasing the number of projects that produce "services" as products, as manufacturing productivity increases, and as the industrial needs of the first world are increasingly met by the growth economics of the developing world. Many writers on management and leadership trends (e.g.Belasco and Stayer, 1993) make the point that work, increasingly, involves the creation, transmission and manipulation of information and knowledge. The trend in the dcveloped world to constraining government expenditure is leading to new approaches to infrastructure projects,

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter I with increasing private sector involvement in initiatives such as PFI (Private Finance Initiative). Enterprises are responding to the changed environment in many ways. A few of these ways that havc significant implications for project management are worth mentioning. As stock markets develop more and more sophisticated electronic means of analysing, comparing and predicting corporate performance, enterprises are developing new and sophisticated methods of valuing themselves, and their component clcments. adopting techniques such as EVA (Economic Value Added) or "balanced scorecards". As specialised knowledge becomes more highly valued, organisations are increasingly turning to techniques such as "outsourcing" to obtain better valuc for non-essential activities, and different forms of strategic relationships with other enterprises that possess complementary capabilities to their own. The drive for survival and financial performance are combining to lead enterprises to continually seek fundamental performance improvements through such activities as business process reengineering and competitive bcnchmarking. Within enterprises, as all these trends combine, the traditional relationships between managers and employees have been forced to respond. Increasingly enterprises are employing concepts such as "self-managing teams" and "empowcmient" with the basic intention of getting higher productivity from each employee. The effect of these changes on projects and project management has been far reaching. The improved business perfomlance resulting from effective use of information technology is leading to an immense increase in the number of "business change'' projects with their associated IT components. Radically new relationships between the "owner" the "operator" the "designer" and thc "constructors" of a particular product such as a road, a hospital or an oil rig arc leading to radically new forms of contract, and to radical new practices such as "alliancing" (whcre different parties to the agreement, for example the operator, the designer and the constructors commit themselves to a common

Towam's Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter I set of objectives, and operate as a single organisation, with gainsharing and pain-sharing arrangements to safcguard the economic interests of each party) or "partncring" (where supplies negotiate a strategic relationship that encompasses many projects, and that establishes the contractual rights, duties, service levels, and financial arrangements by which each project will bc conducted). The overall availability of inexpensive s o h a r e packages such as Microsoft Project and the ease of access to PCs or workstations, combined with the business trends to self-managed teams and to increased employee "empowerment" are changing the focus of project monitoring and control practices. The resulting "decentralisation" is leading to an increased need for large proportions of the project work-force to understand concepts such as risk management and change management, that lie at the heart of good practice for project control. The increasing intensity of global competition is raising the pressure for enterprises to reduce both costs and timescales for their projects.

1.5

-

Project management today how industry thinks about projects.

A review of project management practices and techniques in morc than 5 30 enterprises in industries as diverse as pharmaceuticals, oil, construction, utilities, engineering, aerospace, rail transport, electronics. IT, financial scrvices, tclecomrnunications. retail and manofacti~ring shows up a number of characteristics of projects in the 1990s.

Different industries each have their own way of thinking about projects, their own vocabulary for talking about projects, and thcir own versions of the disciplines of project management. Fora exist to promote cross-business dialogue6, but managers in industry are still prone to complain that since each project is unique, and the drivers of perfornlance in different industries are so different, there is relatively little that can be learned from each other. There is an increasing prc-occupation with the competencies that successful project managers need to possess. Ground-breaking work by Gadeken (1994) identitied that the set of competencies possessed by outstanding project managers is different from that

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 1 possessed by outstanding line managers, and many leading enterprises are now seeking to confirm this for themselves and for their own kind of projects. Professional bodies such as PMI and APM are responding by offering a range of pmfessioiial qualifications. Enterprises that need to respond quickly to external opportunities and that have large numbers of employees engaged on "prqjcct work" rather than "routine work" are turning themselves into "project-based organisations". The language of project nianagcment is thus being extended to include terms such as "project-based managenient" or "management by projects'.. while techniques for the effectivc control of the organisation's resources (such as programme management) are being developed. As the focus of enterprises on business processes continues to sharpen, there is a developing emphasis 011thc processes of projcct management. The 1995 re-issue of PMl's "Guide to the Bociy of Knowledge" (Duncan, 1996), for example, structures most of its text around the 37 processes that it sees as constituting the effective management of projects. Incidentally, only 8 of these are classified by PMI as relating to "project execution", with the remaindcr relating to various aspects of project managenient. Similarly, the release of the CCTA's PRINCE 2 project managenient nlethodology in 1996 is designed around the processcs of projcct management. This increasing focus on processes i s allowing the related conccpts of identifying and describing "best practice" and of "benchmarking" to cnter the arena of project managenient. These factors combined to make the iniprovcmcnt of pro,ject performance a pressing need for industry and coninierce in the closing years of the 2othCentury.

1.5.1

How project performance is measured in industry.

Projects represent an enormous investment by large sectors of industry, so impmving project performance could have a major impact on competitiveness. Although there is general agrccment within industry on the need to improve project performance. there is far from general agreement on how to measure. or even quantify, that improvement. The question of how project performance is measured is both important, and far from straightforward. Recent rescarch such as O'Connor and

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 1 Reinsborough (1992) suggcst that far from improving over time, the actual proportion of projects with a performance regarded as poor or worse is increasing. 1 De Wit (1988) distinguishes between pro.ject success (measured against the overall objectives of the project) and project management success (measured against the widespread and traditional measures of performance against cost , time and quality). He points out that the different objectives that projects are dcsigned to achieve can be arranged in a hierarchy, with not all equally important, and that the diffcrcnt stakeholders in the project such as owner, user, sub-contractor, supplier, or designer may all have success criteria that differ from cach other. This makes the measurement of success a complcx and inexact matter, since it is possible for a project to be a success for one party and a disasZer for another. It can also appear to be a success one day and a failurc the next. The most widespread practice in industry today is to harmonise project and project management success by establishing quantified project objectives in terms of cost (the project budget), schedule (milestones and thc project completion date) and product quality (usually defined in terms of project scope, but often including definitions of the performance of the facility, product or service produced by the project, and increasingly during the 1990s, the benefits that are to be harvested from the product.). Project performance is then measured in terms of actual out-turn compared with the planned out-turn in each of these key dimensions. This is useful for an enterprise in terms of answering the question, "Did things turn out as we planned that they would?", but it doesn't answer questions such as, "Did we get value for money?", "How well did we manage this project?", or "How did our performance compare with that of our competitors?". At present, few organisations are truly in a position to obtain answers to these questions. The answers that are obtained are either restricted to a narrow set of metrics that can bc obtained (such as time to market for a new motor car design) or are largely anecdotal. To answer this kind of question more fully, threc different kinds of metrics are needed (See Figure 3).

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter I Business metrics - the financial and other parameters applied by the provider of funds for the project. Financial measures could include return on investment, while others might include cntry into a ncw and attractive market. These measures will depend upon the strategic intent of the provider of funds. Product metrics - the detailed benchmarks, by which the provider of funds can test whether or not they have been provided with the right product performing to the right standard for the right price and in a timely manner. Comparisons here are likely to bc industry-specific such as the cost of designing and building a 500 MW generator, or thc building of 5 miles of 8-lane motorway. Best-practice mctrics - relate to the practices and disciplines of managing projects, and examine the efficiency and effectiveness of the processes associated with managing the project from start to finish. This research focuses on the third of these, "best practice ntetrics"

Figure 3: D~ferenitjpes ofproject melric

Towards lmproved Project Management Practice: Chapter 1

1.5.2

The need for improvement: why so many projects are seen to fail.

Projects in many industries continuc to be plagued by poor performance (e.g. KPMG, 1997). Well publicised project difficulties such as the Channel Tunncl or the West Midlands Ambulance System, are matclicd by many less visible projects that are marked by "cost overruns, late deliveries. poor reliability, and users' dissatisfaction." (Abdel-Hamid and Madnick, 1991). Cost and schedule overruns, failure of the product to deliver the performance specified, failure to accomplish the beneficial change for which the product was intended, and aborting projects after significant expenditure are all part of cveryday project experience for many enterprises. In spite of the substantial effort invested in projects, enterprises are slow to lcarn lessons from specific projects and apply them to othcrs. Why this should be so is a part of the "conceptoal basis to project management" to which this research intends to contribute. Certainly every project is by definition to some extent unique, and that makes every project a potential learning experience, but it also enhances the difficulty in applying lessons learned on one project to subsequent ones. This is why project based organisations have to learn how to lcarn, both from other organisations' experiences and from their own. Most general textbooks on project management include an early section on "the causcs of pro,ject failure". Kharbanda and Stallworthy (1983) attribute much of the cause of failure to the fact that decisions on project investment are taken by Boards of Directors on the basis of "matheniatical wizardry" applied to numbers that have a very high degree of inherent uncertainty. More generally, "shopping lists" of key reasons are cited, as in the two following. Projects that have,failedgeneralIj>display se~zeralof the following chamcferisticr:1. Tlre ctutornerS condi+ionsqfsati~fictionhave not been k $ negotiated. 12. The project no longer has a high priority. 3. No one seenr to 11. fir churge

#

1

Towards Improved Pmject Management Practice: Chapter I The schedule is too optimistic. 5. The project plan is not used to manage the project. 6. Sufficient resources have not been con~rrritted. 7. Project status is not monitored against theplan. 8. No formal communications plan is in place. 9. The project has lost sight o f its orrginal goals 10. There is no change manage~tlentprocess irt place 4.

(I+:~~socki R. K.. Beck R. Jnr:, and Crane D. B., 1995, p. 57.) Some common reasons,for project nianagentent.faihlre are a.r,follot~:r:I. Lack of a pvo,ject,focal point. 2. Poor choice of organisational form ofstructltr'e. 3. Project efforts in the hands qfone of the lend fu~rctionalgroitp.~. 4. lnadeqrrate invol~amentof team menihers. 5. Inadequate planning. eforts. 6. Lack qf top managerrrent support or project ad~i~inisfratiwr 7. Too little authority in the hands qf tlie project manager. 8. Poor choice of project nzanager. 9. Team not prepared for team efirt.7. 10. Poor project communication. I I. Lack of team blending. 12. Unclear project mission. 13. Objectives are not agreed on; end result is unclear. 14. Innbilir);to estimate tat-get dates. 15. No hard milestone.^; little project control. 16. Poor planning ofproject installation and termination. 17. Poor technical and user doctrmentation. (Kezsbom, Schilling. and Edward. 1989, p. 10).

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter I The trouble with such shopping lists is that each Board of Directors, each Director of Projects and each Project Manager is free to pick for himself or herself the cause that they feel most comfortable eliminating. And when they feel that they have done that, there are plenty of others still left on the list! The task facing the profession of project management is to identify which causes lead to which effects, and thus to pave the way for a transition from "experience-based project management" to "evidence-based project management".

The cyclic nature of this programme of "continuous action research" will become clear in the course of this thesis. At an early stage in the process, after reviewing the discussion in this chapter, six fairly basic research questions were identified as follows: I) What aspects of project management are common to different industries? 2 ) Which aspccts of project management (such as practices or processes) are sufficiently important to project-based organisations that they are felt to be worthy of measurement across industries? 3) What useful cross-industry "metrics" can be developed to mcasure the relative performance of these practices or processes, and what constitutes the "benchmark" for them?

4) What evidence is there from actual project outcomes that the "benchmark" practices translate into actual project performance? 5) In the light of project performance, which practices andfor processes can bc dcrnonstrated to have a determinative influence on project performance? 6 ) How can metrics that are relevant to determinative practices OT processes be incorporated into useful predictive models?

1.7

Conclusion

Projects are a basic element of human endeavour. They have a long history extcnding back to times long before the terms ''project" or "project management" were in common usage. Projects are integral to the way businesses work. One of the fundamental ideas on management

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter I is to break work up into "chunks" that can be managed, and projects are one important type of these "chunks".

Projects are immersed in a social and economic environment, and a systemic context for studying projects will nccd to recognisc thc social context within which enterprises are initiated, the role that projects play in the enterprises and in modifying the social context itself, and finally the way that practices and techniques used in the management of projects are themselves conditioned by the social context. Prqiects have gained in importance during the past two decades as competitive pressures in the business environment have necessitated the creation of products and sewices using increasingly complex technological solutions undcr increasingly tight time, cost and quality constraints. Pel-fomiance is critical, and failure carries a high social and economic cost, so the current state of the art is in developing performance improvement techniques, tools and methods. The stance taken by this research is to make the systemic context explicit, to seek a sound epistemic basis to the research, to adopt a point of view that formally involves a broad range of disciplines and industries, to utilise a pragmatic approach at all times, and to develop a methodology that both makes its concephlal basis explicit and also recognises the contributions that can be made by combining quantitative disciplines (such as benchmarking) with qualitative disciplines (such as process mapping and social-science research). There is a big gap between the abstract concept of how to improve projcct performance and the reality of the existence of tools to do it, so the purpose of this research is above all practical. Answers to six questions will be sought through the research. Chapter 2 will start the search by extracting from projcct management literature a summary of the prevailing worldview adopted by the Western world's projcct management communities, and Chapter 3 will explore why it has been necessary to adopt a new research paradigm in order to create the tools necessary to measure improvetnents in projcct perfortiiancc.

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 1

' Rodney Turner argues this point at some length in Op. Cit. Pages 5 and 6 'The assembly of fifteen organisations into a project managcrnent benchmarking network known as "Europe I" was a part of the comtnercial activity that supported the research programme. The names of these and all subscqt~cntorganisations that became members are given in Appendix P-9. "xodus 18: 13-26 The framework for dividing capitalism into thrce eras -classic, managerial, and information - was developed by James Belasco and Ralph Stayer in some unpublished papen prior to their monograph, "The Flight of the Buffalo". The original material for this research has been gathered from a network of major organizations. Chapter 4 describes the programme's historical development. These general observations are drawn from the members of the network, and from other organisations that are known well to the author. For example PMI (The Project Management Institute) or IPMA (formerly known as Internet), the International Association of Project Management along with its national constituent bodies such APM in UK. Internal docu~nentsavailable to the author from a number of blue-chip private-sector enterprises substantiate this assertion.

'

Towards improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2

2: The worldview of a project manager. The previous Chapter described why it is a matter of practical interest and importance to large sections of industry to irnprovc the practice of project management. The literature on project management is dominated to an overwhelnling degree by practitioner-oriented writings - books and articles dcscribing techniques that have been developed to help with specific aspects of managing projects in particular circumstances, or techniques that have been found to be generally Iielpful for project managers. The whole discipline could be described as "practitioner-led".

A classical approach to the task of rcvicwing the litcrature would be to examine all the theoretical approaches that have been laid down with respect to project management. And this was done. The literature proved to contain a fragmented world of people quoting or assuming theories and applying them to project management with specific circumstances in mind (Cleland and King, 1983; Elmes and Wilemon, 1988; Abdel-Hamid and Madnick, 1991: Barnes, 1996) with no overarching approach to thcory. A notable exception is the recent approach adopted at Erasmus University (Turner and Kecgan, 1999; Turner and Keegan, 2000), although even this is characterising the whole field of project management as being concerned with control theory, thereby playing down the body of theory on organisation developmental and learning (Thomas and Tjider, 2000). The situation was further complicated by the specd of dcveloprnent of the corpus. A recent review of the research into project management during the past forty years (Kloppenborg and Opfer, 2000) found that 60% of the articles published on the subject have been published during the 1990s - which means that approximately a half of all the writing about project management has been written during the period of the research for this thesis. In view of this, and since this research is essentially practical in its intentions, a different approach has been adopted. The chapter bcgins by referring briefly to three representative pieces of empirical research

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2 one each from the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s in order to unde~stand which practices are seen to correlate most closely to project management success.

-

-

A more global contcxt for these empirical studies and the present research has then been established by searching the corpus of project management literature for what is distinctive about the way . a project manager approaches his or her task - what, if you likc, is the distinctive management "worldview". To focus the search, a somewhat .uroiect mechanistic analysis has bccn carried out that combines six rcprcsentative "bodies of knowledge" about project management with a recently published analysis of the topics ofjoumal articles about project management. This created a list of 60 terms that could be said to constitute the "core concepts" of the project manager's worldview.

-

~-

A qualitative analysis of thc definitions of these terns has then been carried out, to create a "narrative framework" of four themes dividcd into eleven topics, which is then described with illustrative citations from the literature. In thc course of this narrative, comments about relevant theory have been interwoven with descriptions of practice, in order to paint as complete a picture as possible of the thinking that has led to the creation of the worldview.

The narrative framework is made explicit in a "systemigram" which hypothesizes how the eleven topics relate to each other, and how thcy combine to deliver the benefits of the project managcmcnt worldview to society, industry and commerce. Finally, the major elements of the existing worldview are compared with the practices found by the empirical research quoted at the start of the Chapter to lead most surely to project succcss, and questions are raised about the completeness and adequacy of current research into the worldview.

2.2

Which practices have been correlated to project success and project failure?

Many of the practitioner-focused textbooks on project management define project success in terms of the time, cost and product perfomlance (expressed as quality, or scope, or conformance to requirements) compared to the plan, but as has been seen above, De Wit (1988) diffcrcntiates between the success of project management

Towards lmproved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2 (for which thesc measures might be broadly appropriate) and the success of the project, which will depend on a wider range of measures. This distinction is important, although often ignored. In this case, De Wit is following the classic work of Baker, Murphy and Fisher (1974), which is described below, and which was subsequently developed further by the same authors (1988). They conclude that "if the project meets thc technical performance specifications and/or mission to be performed, and if there is a high lcvcl of satisfaction concerning the project outcome among key people in the parent organisation, key people in the client organisation, key people on the project team and key users or clientele of the project effort, the project is considered an overall success." (ibid. p.903) The importance of the distinction is eniphasised by Munns and Bjeirmi (1996). who draw attention to the short-term goals of the projcct manager (in delivering the required product or service to schedule and within budget) as opposed to the long-tern1 goals of the project (to deliver the promised business benefits). Kerzner makes a similar distinction between "successful projects" and "successf~~llymanaged projects". "Successful implementation of project management does not guarantee that individual projects will be successful . . . Conipanies excellent in pro,ject management still have their share of project failures. Should a company find that 100 percent of their projects are successful, then that company is simply not taking enough business risks." (Kenner, 1998a, p. 37) This discussion gives some indication of the complications inherent in assessing the extent to which improved project management practice can be shown to be of benefit to an organisation. Much of thc literature has been derived directly or indirectly from Baker, Murphy and Fisher's analysis of 650 projects (1974), as is shown in Crawford's (2000) comprehensive review of the literature on project management success. In order to establish a datum against which to compare the findings from this research programme, three studies based on empirical research have been described below: Baker, Murphy & Fisher's (1988) considered findings from their analysis of 650 aeronautical, construction and other projects; Pinto and Slevin's studies (1988a; 1988b) of answers provided by 41 8 project managers various industries , and Lechler's survey (1998) of 448 projects in Germany. These three

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2 have been chosen as representative because of their empirical data froni large samples of data, because they include projccts from different industries, because they use complcmcntary data analysis methods, and because they cover thc past three decades, during which time 99% of all the articles published about project management have been written. (Kloppenborg and Opfer, 2000)

2.2.1

Baker, Murphy and Fisher

Baker, Murphy and Fisher adopted the definition of success that has already been cited above. It includes a number of factors, and the perceptions of success of different groups of stakeholders. Their conclusion is that there are 29 factors that strongly affect the perceived failure of projects, 24 factors that are necessary, but not sufficient, for perceived success, and 10 factors that are strongly linearly related to both perceived success and perceived failure (i.e. their prcscnce tends to improve perceived success, while thcir absence contributes to perceived failure). The output nieasure (whether the project was successful or not) was a simple categorization of projects into three success "bands", based on a multiple of the factors contributing to their definition of success. The ten factors are set out below. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10.

Goal commitment of project team. Accurate initial cost estimates. Adequate project team capability. Adequate funding to completion. Adequate planning and control techniques. Minimal start-up difficulties. Task (vs. social) orientation. Absence of bureaucracy. On-site project manager. Clearly established success criteria.

2.2.2

Pinto and Slevin

Pinto and Slcvin derived from Baker, Murphy and Fisher an understanding of the factors that influence project success, and then developed from it a more explicit definition of the factors that

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2

contribute to success (See Figure 4). Thcy then assesscd the opinions of 418 PMI members who responded to a questionnaire about which factors were critical to which elements of project success (just over half of them were project managers, and nearly a third were members of projcct teams). They also related the results to the particular phase of the projcct's lifc cycle within which each of the factor9 were signiticant., using a simple four-phase model: conceptualisation, planning, execution and termination. Participants were instructed to "think of a project in which they were involved that was currently imcier way or recently completed. This project was to be their framc of rcfcrence while completing the questionnaire. The four phase project life cycle . . . was included in thc questionnaire, and was used to identify the current phase of each project." (Pinto and Slevin, 1988a, p. 70)

The results identified ten "critical success factors", which were then devclopcd into an instrument to allow project managcrs to identify how successful they were being in managing their project. The ten factors are listed below. 1.

Project mission - initial clarity of goals and general direction.

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2

2. Top management support - willingness of top management to provide the necessary resources and authoritylpower for project success. 3. Project schedule/plans - a detailed specification of the individual action steps required for project implementation. 4. Client consultation - communication, consultation and active listening to all impacted parties. 5. Personnel - recruitment, selection and training of the necessary personnel for the project team. 6 . Technical tasks - availability of the required technology and expertise to accomplish the specific technical action steps. 7. Client acceptance - the act of "selling" the final product to its ultimate intended users. 8. Monitoring and feedback - timely provision of comprehensive control infomiation at each phase in the implementation process. 9. Communication - the provision of an appropriate network and necessary data to all key factors (sic) in the project implementation. 10. Trouble-shooting - ability to handle unexpected crises and deviations from plan.

2.2.3

Lechler

Lechler, in the most recent of the three empirical studies, also started from an analysis of the literature. His starting point was that "cause and effect" is rarely taken into consideration, but rather that the "critical success factors" are analyscd as separate, independent variables. He reviewed 44 studies, covering a total of more than 5,700 pro.jects and from them deduced that 11 discrete key success factors could be identified. Out of these, he chosc the eight that were most frequently cited for his own empirical analysis. Working from Pinto & Slevin's questionnaire, Lechler isolated 50 questions that corresponded to his chosen eight critical success factors, and distributed it to members of the Gernlan project Management GPM). Each Society (Gescllschaft fur Projektn~anagement respondent was sent two questionnaires and asked to complete one for a project that they considered to be successful, and one for a project that they considered to be unsuccessful. They were invited to assess the project as successful if "all people involved" regarded the process -

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2 (social success), the quality of the solution (effectiveness) and the adherence to time and cost objectives (eficiency) as overall positive. A total of 448 questionnaires were received and analysed. 257 of them relating to "successful" projects, and 191 to "unsuccessf~~l" ones.

The first step in Lechlcr's analysis was to seek correlations between and ovcrall individual technical factors included in the q~~cstionnairc project success. Only four factors were found to have significant correlations: The appropriate technology (equipment. training programmes etc.) has been selected for the project. Communication channels were defined before the start of the project. All proceeding methods and tools were used to support the project well. Project leader had the necessary authority (a composite of four different questions) The second step in the analysis was to carry out a LISREL analysis (Linear Structural Relationships) for the eight critical success factors. This resulted in the path diagram shown in Figure 5.

Weightings were calculated for the varior~s different paths of "causality" which, cumnlatively, gave a value for 2 of 0.59: 0.47 from

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2 the "people" factors (top management, project leader and project team), and only an incremental 0.12 from the "activities" (participation, planning and control & infomiation and communication) and "baniers" (conflicts and changes of goals). Lechler indicates the importance that he attaches to this conclusion through his choice of titlc for the paper "When it comes to project management, it's the people that matter." Thc weighting given to each of the eight factors was a follows: Factor Top Management Project Leader Project Team Participation Planning/controlling Information/communication Conflicts Goal changes

2.2.4

Direct 0.19 0.16 0.16 0.12 -0.21 -0.20

Indirect 0.41 0.18 0.36 0.10 0.01 0.06 -0.08

Total 0.60 0.18 0.52 0.10 0.17 0.1 S -0.29 -0.20

The implications of "critical success factors"

The implication from these three pieces of research (and others that follow a broadly similar line) is that some aspects of project managcmcnt are more important than others. They purport to give the practitioner some guidance in terms of what aspects of project management to concentrate on. Later in this chapter, the conclusions will be reviewed for completeness against the broad backdrop of a project manager's worldview. But before that can be done, it is necessary to make that worldview explicit, and to express it cohesently.

2.3

What a worldview is and how it can be made visible

Project manag2ment is not often thought about or referred to as a "worldview". It is much more frequently referred to in tcrms of techniques and practices - "a core competency, widely recognized across a wide range of industry scctors" (Morris, 2000) or even, increasingly. as a profession e.g. (Turner, 2000b). This development is itself an interesting phenomenon that begs the question, "What is it about project management that leads its practitioners to regard themselves as nienibers of a unique profession?" -

Towards Improved Pq'ect Management Practice: Chapter 2 Whatever it is that distinguishes project management, it involves a way of thinking about work in project terms and a way of putting that thinking into action. It employs a set of categories and makes a number of distinctions1 that facilitate the management of projects and project teams. Project management can be thought of, in other words, as a worldview. "Worldviews have to do with the presuppositional, pre-cognitive stage of a culture or society. Wherever we find the ultimate concerns of human beings, we find worldviews. . . 'Worldview', in fact. embraces all deep-level human perceptions of reality." (Wright, 1997: 122-123) Distinguishing and describing a worldview isn't easy. By its very nature it is invisible, embedded in the fabric of society and practice. To achieve the goal of making it visible will necessitate distinguishing figure from ground until, as in some etching by Escher, the project management worldview can be made to stand out from the environment that surrounds it. Possibly the most breathtaking example of using a study of worldviews to perform serious historical research in an area strewn liberally with the burnt-out hulks of scholars who have sclf destructed has been canied out by Tom Wright in the first two sections of a projected 5 part work examining the origins of the Christian religion. (Wright, 1997; Wright, 1999) For the purposes of this study, the full rigour of Wright's method is scarcely appropriate, but if significant improvements arc to be lllade to project management practice, it is necessary to find some way of describing the project management worldview, and seeking areas in which it might be incomplete or unhelpful. Wright distinguishes four elements to any worldview - stories, questions and answers. symbols and praxis. This chapter will focus on only one of thcm. As projects have increased in importance to organisations, thinking about project management has developed proportionately and an extensive corpus of literature has grown up, most of it designed for or written by project management practitioners. It is in this corpus that the search can bcgin for the "praxis" of project management - the most readily accessible aspect of the worldview.

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2

2.4.1

"Praxis"-What a project manager does.

There are many ways to approach the topic of project management "praxis", and the development of "praxis" has been what this whole programme of research is about. Chapter 4 describes the cycles of action research that have contributed to the understanding expressed in this dissertation, but the point should be made that the "worldview" described in this chapter is the latest of a number of iterations that have been emerging over a period of six years. Indeed, the work in this chapter, culminating in the creation of a "cause and cffcct" diagram (Figure 6) explaining how the elements of a project manager's worldview inter-relate is, in itself, a piece of original research that combines a review of the literature, cxpcrt validation of conclusions extracted from this, qualitative research to construct a narrative worldview, and system dynamics thinking to generate the "systemigram". In terms of the literature, however, a sensible place to start is to examine the practices that arc seen by the professional bodies as constitutive of project management in the "bodies of knowledgc" (BOKs). There are a number of these BOKs including those supported by PMI (which is more correctly referred to as a "guide" to the body of knowledge, rather than confusing the information contained in a publication with the "knowledge" itself (Duncan, 1996), by APM (APM, 1995), by IPMA (Caupin et al., 1999), by the Centre for Management by Projects at UMIST on behalf of the APM (Moms, 2000), and by the International Journal of Project Management (Turner, 2000a; Turner, 2000b). The organisations taking part in this research programme have themselves developed what could be regarded as a list of topics that should be included in any guide to the "body of knowledge" about project management. Each of these six BOKs is presented in terms of its own classification structure, in some cases with major differences. The focus at this early stage of the discussion, howcver, is better trained on the "content" of the knowledge. rather than how it is structured. Appendix P-I, Table 1 lists the topic areas that are used to describe categories in each of these

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2

six BOKs, with each list arranged in alphabetical order and stripped of all explicit structure. Appmaching the topic from a different angle, Max Wideman (1999) has published on the Internet a comprehensive glossary of terms used in association with project management, and in an unpublished paper, has further crystallised these down into a list of more than 3000 "single term" conccpts (Wideman, 2000). His list forms an excellent basis for crystallising out from the alternative BOKs those terms, and therefore the concepts behind them, that underpin the "worldview" of a project manager. Taking each of the ternis listed in Table 1 of the Appendix P-I, thc most appropriate term or terms from Wideman's glossary were identified that described the terms as used in the BOK. This gave a single list of 202 terms, as shown in Table 2 in the same appendix. This list doesn't contain terms describing all the concepts tliat shape a project manager's "praxis", but it does contain all those terms that are used by one or more BOKs to provide a heading for knowledge arcas tliat are important to a project manager. It could be said to be the most important high-level conccpts that a ''professional" project manager could be expected to know about. Sadly, it is still fairly extensive, and some more winnowing is in order.

2.4.2

Salient elements of the "praxis"

A further insight into the "praxis" that most concerns prqjcct managers can be obtained from examining the contents of the "professional" journals that prqject managers contribute to. In the English language. there are priniarily two of these - the International Journal of Project Management (published in Europe) and the Project Management Journal (published in USA). A recent article in IJPM (Themistocleous and Wearne, 2000) identified the topics that had been most extensively written about in IJPM from 1984 to 1998, and examined how the balance had changed during the time. The same article compared the balancc of topics between IJPM and PMJ for a ten year period from 1990 to 1998. Appendix P-I, Table 3 contains a summary of the data from this article, while Appendix L-1 contains somewhat more detail.

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2

This data can also be correlated to Wideman's single term glossary, so that it is possible to create a single "high level" list of the concepts that are of most interest to the professional project manager by selecting from tlic list of terms in Appendix 2 Table 2 those terms that occur in two or more BOKs. and that are implicit in the 44 topics identified by Theniistocleous and Weame. (2000) That gives the list of 60 terms contained in Table 2. The numbers refer to the alphabetic position of thc tern1 in Appendix P-I, Table 2. No. Single Term Glossary 12 Business case 15 Cliange 16 Change control 18 Close-out 2 1 Communication 26 Configuration management 27 Conflict management 29 Contract administration 33 Cost 35 Cost control 39 Culture 42 Design 47 Estimating 50 Finance 5 1 Financial management 53 Hand-over 56 Industrial relations 59 Information management 64 Integration 67 Leadership 71 Legal awareness 74 Management by projects 78 Managing change 79 Marketing 85 Negotiation 9 1 Organisation structure 92 Organisational design 9 3 -gO r -

% 84-98

0% 3%

3% 1% 9% 5%

2%

4% 0% 18% 1% 3% 1%

1%

BOKS 1

2 3 3 4 3 3 2 1 2 2 2 2 3 I 2 I 1 3 3 1 2 2 3 3 2 2 2

Towam's Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2 96 97 98 100 106 I 11 1 14 1 16 1 17 1 18 124 125 127 130 136 137 139 142

[

186 190 192 I

Perforniance measurement Performance measurement tcchniques Performance reporting Personnel management Post-project evaluation review Procurement Program management Project appraisal Project close-out Project context Project life cycle Project management Project management plan Project organisation Project startup Project strategy Project success/failurc criteria Quality Quality management Requiremcnts management Resource management Resource planning Risk management Safety Sales Schedule control Strategy Success, project Systems management Teamwork Testing Valuc management -

4%

7% 7%

4% 4% 0%

lilhlt 2 . . S I ~ I P(Ii I~I~ ~ c c .trtp taqpmjccr ninrzaprr'c ~orMt,it.~t:

Definitions for each of these terms from Wideman's glossary (1999) are provided in Appendix 5. A careful analysis of these definitions using Nvivo software shows that the sixty core terms can be related to the

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2 clcments of the total project management system as follows (see Figure 2 in Chapter I, and Figure 21 in Chapter 4). Technical Topics

People Topics

Chanp control ( I ) Close-out Configuration management Contract administration Cost Cost control Design Estitnnting

Hand-ovcr Infomation management Integration (I) Performance Measuretnem Performance Measurement Techniques ("PMT") Performance Reponing Project Appraisal Concerned with the Project itself, or the product it is producing.

PmjKt

Conflict Management Integration ( I )

c ~ ~ ~ ~ . o ~ ~Leadenhip

Prqiecl Life Cycle

Project Management Pmiect Management Plan

Project Organisation Teamwork

Pmjed Stan-t~p Project Stra1e.g Project Stacess/Faihtre Criteria Qumlily Quality Management Requirelnents Managcmenl Resource Management Resnnrce Planning Risk Managemnt

Safety Schedule Contml Success, pro.ject System Management Testing Value Imnagement concerned with h h the Enterprise and the Pmjcct.

Business Case

Communication

Change Comml(2)

Culture

Comnlunication

Integration (2)

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2 Finance Financial Management I.epal Awareness

Organisation Stnrclwc

Organisatianal Design

Organisationnl Learning Post-Pmiect Evalultinn Review

Pronlrement Pmpmm Management

I

Imlustrial Relations

Marketing

Enterprise t~ndetiakingthe Proiect I

Personnel M a n a p n r n t I

I

Tnhle 3 . A project mnnr~ger's.fontr,defirted hy tire elentmtts o f tlie syrter~i.

2.4.3

Validation of the core "praxis" elements

The technique described above to narrow down the field of prqject management "praxis" to manageablc proportions was very mechanistic. It has resulted in a certain amount of near duplication (e.g. "change" and "managing change", “performance measurement" and "performance measurement techniques"). Nevertheless, it has found substantial confirmation in oractice. In a tonic such as ,uroiect , management, which is so heavily practitioner-led, tacit knowledge plays a significant role. Under these circumstances. the opinions of .ueonle . who are widely respected in the profession, and who have acquired substantial personal experience in the field, is an important source of such tacit knowledge. (Skyrme, 1997) At a workshop in Haugesund, Norway in Junc 20002, organiscd by Lynn Crawford, and sponsored by Telenor, a group of thirty acknowledged international "thought leaders" from the world of pro,ject management were asked to use the basic sixty terms to propose alternative structures for the proiect management "body of knowledge" from alternative perspectives. Groups workcd on this from the point of view of project sponsors, Chief Executives of comniereial orpanisations, project managers, project management educators and disseminators, and managers of portfolios of projccts. None of these groups found that the sixty elements were unsuitable for the task - there were neither significant omissions, nor unsupportable elements that did not belong. Minor omissions, and the removal of duplication were all that was necessary to use the terms as a minimalist

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2 pointer to the extent of the knowledge necessary to support project management. This method of validation is entirely consistent with the methodology employed throughout the action research programme that is described in this thesis - making usc of the tacit knowledge of a "community of practice" to validate hypotheses, prior to taking action that could indicate the validity of the hypothesis. On its own, it proves nothing, but taken with the other indications, it provides "triangulation" or "complementarity" for the field of research. (Flood and Romm, 1997) It should be pointed out also, that the glossary of terms, which was used as the basis for the mechanistic part of the praxis, was itself augmented by terms produced in a workshop in Norfolk, Virginia in June 1 9 9 9 , also organised by Lynn Crawford and sponsored by NASA, which was the forerunner of the Haugesund event.

2.4.4 A review of the "praxis" elements Once the mechanistic part of the rcview was completed, a qualitative analysis followed. The definitions were imported into a qualitative analysis software programme (Nvivo), and the text in the definitions was encoded according to the three kinds of topics identified in the most recent version of the Corporate Practice Questionnaire used in the action research part of this research (See Chapter 4 and Appendix P-5). Table 3, containing this initial analysis, shows that project managers are overwhelmingly concerned with techniqucs to assist with the management of thcir particular project and to a lesser extent with linking their project into the enterprise that is sponsoring it. The reasons for this are not hard to find. Projects are different from operations, as was made clear in Chapter 1, and the overwhelming focus of management attention and management theory has been on the management of ongoing opcrations. It is hardly surprising, therefore, that project management praxis has concentrated on those practiccs that are useful for managing a project and that are different from those generally encountered in the management of ongoing operations. The second part of this qualitative analysis consisted of seeking to identify specific themes and topics that could be regarded as forming a possible "framework" for a "narrative" account of the worldview. This

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2 called for a much greater exercise of personal judgement and intuition, and was accomplished in three iterations. Firstly, each definition was carefully read through, the underlying topics were identified. and the coding was accomplished. Each term could be coded to any number of different topics. The second iteration consisted of writing a first draft narrative, drawing on the definitions of the core terms, on the points made about the topics in the literature, and on relevant theory. Finally, elements of unnecessary duplication were removed, through making a serious attempt to locate each core term in the specific theme or topic to which it most readily applies, allowing duplicates only where the theme or topic are seriously depleted by the omission of the term. Summary of themes, topics and terms The following list summarises the elements of the worldview, as they will be discussed in thc narrative framework. In total there are five themes and eleven topics. Theme I: Practices relating to the nahtre qf the particular[?roject

Topic 1: Establishing a strategic framework for the project. Topic 2: Establishing, specifying and achieving the project's goals. Topic 3: Defining, specifying, assuring, manufacturing and delivering the product or service. Topic 4: Identifying, structuring, planning, executing and controlling the work to be carried out. Topic 5: Managing the uncertainty that is inherent in thc uniqueness of the project. Theme 2 (Topic 6): Practices relating to tile stages the project th ill need to pas.v tlirorcgh Tltenle 3: Practices relating to "henejcial change" that the project is intended to accomplish

Topic 7: Projects as a means of implementing business strategy Topic 8: Defining, quantifying and harvesting organisational benefits as a result of carrying out the project. Topic 9: Allocating organisational resources to the project

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2 Theme 4: Practices I-elatingto the people thrrt are associated with the enterprise

Topic 10: Identifying and aligning the interests of the project "stakeholders". Topic 1 1: Creating, leading and managing the temporary team who will carry out the project. For the sake of clarity, each of the sixty key terms is underlined in the text that follows the first time that it appears in each of the eleven topics. Extensive use is made of the actual definitions of terms, and these are attributed to thcir source according to the list of definitions published in Appendix P-1, Tahle 5 T h e m e 1: Practices relating to t h e nature of t h e particular project In Chapter 1 , the definition of work that could reasonably regarded as a project was "a unique scope of work that is constrained by cost and time, the purpose of which is to create or modify a product or service so as to achieve beneficial change defined by quantitative and qualitative objcctives." Apart from the catch-all group of practices defined simply as "proiect management" (which was discussed fully in Chapter I), there seem to be five prominent groups of practices that make up practices for dealing with a particular projcct, each of which makes sense in tcrms of the above definition. Practiccs to assist with identifying and taking the necessary strategic decisions about how the project is to be governed, planned and controlled. Practices to assist with the formulation, definition, refinement, acccptance and achievement of the project's goals - "qualitative and quantitative objectives". Practices to assist with the requirements, design, manufacture, quality assurance and delivery of the product or service that the prqject is intended to create or modify - "create or modify a product or service". Practices to assist with dcfining, structuring, planning, controlling and executing the work to be done to accomplish the project's

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2

goals and to deliver the required pmduct or service "a unique scopc of work". Practices to assist with the management of the inherent uncertainty associated with the unique nature of the project and its environment - "constrained by cost and time". Topic I: Establishing a strategic framework for the project. The three topics that project managers think about when considering the strategic issues raised by the specific nature of the project are design, project strategy and information managcmcnt.

is "the process of developing and documenting a solution to a problem using technology experts and tools."(Wideman, 1999). As such it influences not only the product or service that is to be delivered, but also how the product or service is bcst to be specified, designed, manufactured and implemented. This calls for a proiect stratea. "Projects should have a high level comprehensive dcfinition of the way they are to be developed and managed. All major issues should be addressed i.e. technical, financial, organisational, time and quality as well as safcty, human resources. logistics, procurement, information systems and technology." (Wideman, 1999) Thus, presumably, the prqject strategy document is intended to cover both prqject governance and operational planning and control. The strategy will usually be developed as a part of the initial project plan development, and will ultimately be reflected in thc oroicct management ~ l a (see n Topic 2, below). Implied in the project strategy will be the need for information management - "the management of the systems, activities, and data that allow information in a project to be effectively acquired, stored, processed, accessed, communicated, and archived. There should be a valid audit trail of this communication process. Projccts gcncrate and absorb significant quantities of information. It is important that the project has an effective information management system. Tools and techniques for monitoring progress." (Morris, 1999). This definition, the most comprehensive of those provided by Wideman, is in itself revealing. It can be argued that the primary purpose of information is to provide control, rather than simply to provide commnnication to interested parties. As will be seen later in this Chapter (for example in

Towards lmpmved Project Management Pmctice: Chapter 2 Figure 7) and more significantly in Chapter 5, the explicit consideration of precisely how projects are controlled (in the technical sense of how people in authority respond when reality diverges from plans) is one area that is incompletely understood. Topic 2: Esfablishing, specifying and achieving the project's goals. The central concept that drives the definition of project goals is establishing proiect success/failure criteria. These arc "the criteria by which the success or failure of a project may be assessed." (Wideman, 1999). More specifically, they are "criteria that should be clearly defincd and agreed before significant development is initiated. These may be defined in a number of ways such as: business objectives (or goals); requirements, typically technical (performance) requirements ; critical success factors, typically measurable factors that, when present in the project's environment, are most conducive to the achievement of a successful project; key performance indicators, typically measures upon which the project will be judged. Success Criteria and the manner of their achievement should be documentcd in the project's strategy plan." (Morris, 1999) What constitutes success or failure has already been discussed in Section 2.2. Once the criteria for success have been defined, they are embodied in a , is "a baseline tool used as a rcference proiect management ~ l a nwhich for managing the project. It is the most important docunient in the overall planning, monitoring, and implementation of a project and it should be 'owned' by the project manager and his or her team. The plan should include: a definition of overall objectives, statements on how these should be achieved (and verified); cstimates of the time required; the budget; quality policy; safety, health and environmental policies, and the risk management strategy." (Morris, 1999) Other items of a technical, commercial, organisational, personnel or control nature might also be included. "The Project Management Plan establishes project management's interpretation of the why, what, how, who, how much, and when of the project." (Moms, 1999) People are involvcd in the creation of the project management plan during "the complex sequence of activities that are required to start the

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2

project, mobilize the team, initiate the project definition process. obtain agreement to the project's objectives and plan to deliver them." (Widernan, 1999) These activities are known collectively as oroiect start-up. Two of the "softer" or people-oriented sets of concepts become important during and after project start-up: leadershin and conflict maliaecment. Leadership is important because "the project manager typically works through a project team consisting of individuals with diverse backgrounds. education, experiences and interests. One secret to successful project implementation is the project manager's ability to get this diverse group of actors performing at niaxinial effectiveness. Consequently the project manager most be both a leader and a motivator of the members of the project tcani. He or slic is oftcn required to work through others while possessing minimal legitimate line authority over their actions. Consequently, the techniques of effective leadership and motivation become very important in tlie project management context." (Slevin and Pinto, 1988, p. 739). Conflict management matters bccause "conflicts are very likely to occur in the temporary project environment where the project managcr is often the new player who has not had time to develop good working relationships with project team members or with supporting functional managers. The conflict potential is also increased by tlie great differences between the project and functional goals and objectives, and by tlie unavoidable competition between projects for rcsources."(Stuckenbruck, 1988, p. 73). An interesting case study describing the cffccts of conflict, also shows the benefits of designing a research intervention that employs multiple mctliodologics. (Bcnnct et al., 1997) Throughout the process, a key project management function that influences not only the goals of tlie project, but all aspects of its management is integration - "the process of bringing people, activities and other things together to perform effectively." (Wideman, 1999) It is this aspect that is most emphasized by Gaddis (1 959) in his classic article. Three specific aspects of planning are relevant to making the goals tangible and measurable: cost planning and cost control, resource

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2

m.

Taken planning and control and schedule planning and together, these three elements express the project's goals in terms of three types of measirrable quantities that can be controlled during the execution of the project. "Cost can be divided into internal and external expenses. External costs can be controlled by contracts and budgets for each phase of a project and for each deliverable or work product. Internal cost is the cost of project resources." (Wideman. 1999) Resource planning involves "evaluating what resources are needed to complete a project and determining the quantity needed." (Wideman, 1999) And schedule planning and control can be viewed as "project time management [a more technically precise name for schedule planning and control, and which] includes the processes required to ensure timely completion of the project." (Duncan, 1996) All of these depend on the practices and disciplines of defining and managing thc product to be delivered, and the work to be done, which are two topics that are dealt with in separate sections below. Schedule control has become a topic of interest and controversy within the project management occupation, with the application of ?theory of constraints" to project management. (Goldratt, 1997) Increasingly during the 1990s project managers have taken the opportunity during the course of the project to evaluate and re-evaluate whcthcr the project is being conducted in the most effective way, using value management. Value management is "a structured means of improving effectiveness in line with the organisation's goals. It refers to the overall process of identifying key issues and setting targets; identifying the teams and processes necessary to achieve these; and implementing these to obtain successful results. It is concerned with the broader optimisation of strategic issues, encompasses the value engineering process at thc project's strategic definition stage and is generally done via a structured workshop." (Morris, 1999) During the course of a project, the means used to monitor the accomplishment of project goals are generically known as performance measurement. Thc APM Body of Knowledge (APM, 1995) describes perforniance measurement as "the concept used to represent physical progress achieved in relation to cost and schedule performance by means of introducing thc calculation of Earned Value." The term

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2 4

"Earned value " was developed in 1963. and first introduced a year later as a part of the U.S. DoD's Minuteman Contractor Performance Measurement System. (Moms, 1994) Earned Value Analysis has now become the most widely practiced among performance measurement techniaues. The technique of "Earned Value Analysis" is a coniponent of tlie CJSPEC methodology (Fleming, 1992), and it is now firmly entrenched in practice as a means of measuring the progress of both cost and schedde against original estimates. BS6079 (1996) asserts that "a key principle of good project management practice is the use of perforniance measurement techniques such as earned value analysis at the task level", and even where doubts are expressed as to the strength of both the underlying assumptions and the underlying mathematical model (Maylor, 1996) tlie usefulness of the technique to the "beleaguered project manager.' is acknowledged (albeit somewhat with tongue in cheek). A study carricd out on behalf of the DoD by Arthur D. Little in 1983 concluded that CISCSC contributed more benefits than it cost, but suggested some improvements that were desirable. (Fleming, 1992) There are two aspects to monitoring the accomplishment of project goals. During the course of the project, performance reporting is used, and after completion of the project post-oroiect evaluation review. "An important review of project performance and lessons that can be derived from the prqject conducted once operations have started. Although often considered only after completion of the project. in practice Project Evaluation can and should be a fully integral part of the project. Similar reviews should therefore also be carricd out periodically during the course of the project, with the resultant information/lessons fed back into this and other projects." (Morris, 1999) A recent qualitative analysis of four soch appraisals has identified both the difficulties and the benefits from conducting such reviews. (Busby, 1999) Unfortunately, although virtually every body of knowledge professes the importance of these reviews, they are ~arely written about in any journals (Themistocleous and Weanie. 2000), because of the pressure on project managers to get on with their next project. (Cooke-Davies, 2000b)

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2 Topic 3: Defining, specijling, assuring, manufacturing and delivering the product or service. The first step in defining the product or servicc that the project will produce is known to project managers by the term requirements management, defined as "the process of defining the user/customer requirements and building the system requirements before going on to develop the performance specifications in detail. Requirements should be comprehensive and clear, well strticturcd, traceable and testable. They should give rise to clcarly specified project deliverables and should be testcd against the original set of requirements. Any changes to the initial requirements should be traceable i.e. documented and explainable." (Morris, 1999) Two constraints that will generally bound the freedom to fulfil the requirements are the availability of money, which calls for tinancial management, and the legal and commercial context within which the product or service is being delivered. This latter requires kgd awareness. Financial management can be thought of as "management of the tinancial activities of the organisation, program, project or major work package."(Wideman, 1999) More recently, it has been observed that "financing the project is normally the sponsor's responsibility. The projcct management team should know, and be sensitive to, the impact of how the project is financed and the particular requircnlcnts imposed on the project by its financing. . . .Some understanding of the relationship between management accounting and project accountinglcost control is generally necessary." (Dixon, 2000) Legal awareness is "an awareness of the relevant legal duties, rights, and processes which govern in a particular project situation. It may cover potential causes of disputes, liabilities, breaches of contract, means of resolving a dispute, and legal basics of industrial relations." (Morris, 1999) The details of how the product or service is to be manufactured or otherwise provided are detailed in the proiect management olan, which was described above. Two particular sets of practices have been developed and refined to assist with the manufacturing of the product or service svstems management and procurement. -

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2 Systems management can be thought of as "the elaboration of the specification for the technical, organisational, cost, time and other parameters of a system and the subsequent management of the planning, design, engineering, procurement, implementation and testing areas of the work needed to realize the system conccpt. Systems management comprises the prime activities of systems analysis, systems design and engineering and systems development. Editor's Note: 'development' in this context means the implementation of tlie design and engineering". (Projcct Manager Today, 1997) quoted in (Wideman, 1999) Procurement, on the other hand, while always used to some extent on every project, is particularly relevant when a project strategy has been adopted that requires major parts of the product the bc acquired from external suppliers. Procurement is "the process of acquiring new services or products. It covers the financial appraisal of the options available, development of the procurement or acquisition strategy, preparation of contract documentation, selection and acquisition of suppliers, pricing, purchasing, and administration of contracts. It may also extend to storage, logistics, inspection, expediting. transportation. and handling of materials and supplies. It may cover all members of the supply chain. For example, operations and maintenance needs to be l y management process." (Morris, 1999) supported through a s ~ ~ p pchain Clearly, the activities involved in tlie practice of integration (described above) play a major part in producing tlie product or service, as do three other topics that make up a part of the project manager's quality nianaaement and value manarremcnt. worldview -

a,

A widely accepted definition of quality is "the totality of features and characteristics of a product or service that bear on its ability to satisfy stated or implied needs." (IS0 8402 quoted in (Ireland. 1991)) while quality management eompriscs "all the activities of the overall management fi~nctionthat determine tlie quality policy, objectives and responsibilities, and that implement them by means such as quality planning, quality control, quality assurance and quality improvenient within the quality nianagement system." (Caupin et al.. 1999)

Value management has been discussed above, but it clearly assists the prqject team to refine the product or service that is being protlucecl. As tlie product nears completion. the project manager is advised to pay attention to to hand-over and to proiect closc-out.

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2 Testing is "that element of inspection that determines the properties or elements, including functional operation of supplies or their components, by thc application of established scientific principles and proccdurcs." (US Federal Acquisition Regulations, quoted in (Ireland, 1991).) Hand-over is "a process of transfer of responsibility for all or part of a project or its deliverables. Typically, this takes place at the end of a project or a niajor part thereof." (Widenian, 1999) It is closely related to the idea of project close-out - "a process that provides for acceptance of the project by the project sponsor, completion of various project records, final revision and issue of docunlentation to reflect the "as-built" condition and the retention of essential project documentation." (Duncan, 1996) Topic 4: IdentiMng, structuring, planning, executing and contrdling the work to be camed out. If a new or modified product or service is to be specified, designed, constructed, tested and dclivered, then one of the central tasks of project management is to identify what work needs to be done and who is to do it, and then to oversee the work so that it is done as well as possible. "A fundamental aspect of effcctive project planning, and therefore of effcctive project management, is the process of defining the scope of the project and of breaking this into manageable pieces of work." (Dixon, 2000) Techniques for doing this have been at the heart of the practitioner focus on project management, at least since the time of Henry Gantt, originator of the eponymous Gantt chart. A whole series of practices embracing integration, estimating, schedule control, resource planning and management, orocurement. and reauirements management contribute to the effective dcfinition of the work to be done. In some industries, safetv (more generally referred to under the generic heading of HSE - Health, Safety and the Environment) assumes a significant role in dictating not only what work is to be carried out, but how it is to be exccutcd. Similarly, if a "procurementm-based prqject strategy has been adopted, then it is important to allow for contract administration, the-"monitoring and control of performance, reviewing progress, making payments, recommending modifications and

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2

approving contractor's actions to ensure compliance with contractual terms during contract execution." (Widenian, 1987) Two further concepts that are important to the management of projects and lcss so to the management of operations are change control, and the related techniques of configuration management. Change management, as it is generally defincd, has two dill'ercnt aspects to it. The one relating to the work to be done on a projcct is Yltc process of accepting or rejecting changes to the project's baselines. Lack of change control is one of the most common causes of scope creep." (Wideman. 1999) "Configuration management is the process of ensuring that the project delivers everything it is supposed to - physical products and assets, quality products, documentation, deliverables etc. - such that there is complete assurance on delivery integrity. It is particularly concerned with managing the status of pending and approved changes to the projcct deliverables and with managing the information that define the configuration status." (Dixon, 2000) Since work is generally accomplished by a group of people, two of the "softer" concepts that constitute the prqject manager's worldview are relevant to the topic of the work to be done - tcatnwork and conflict management. "Effective teamwork is generally at the heart of effective project management. The project management professional should be familiar with the process of forming a group of people into a project team that is to work together for the benefit of the prqject. This can be achieved in a formal manner by use of start-up meetings. seminars, worksliops, etc. and in an infortnal manner by getting the team to work well togethcr. Motivating and resolving conflicts between individual members of the team are important elements of teamwork. Cult~~ral characteristics of the team members should bc given full consideration: different cultures create different working needs." (Dixon. 2000) Topic 5: Managing the uncertainty that is inherent in the uniqueness of the project. A central construct of thc prqject manager's worldview is the need to manage the risk inherent in the project. A risk is an event that may or may not happen, and that, if it does, will have adverse consequences for the project. Project risk management is a relatively new field, but it is one that has received a grcat dcal of attention in recent years.. "All projects, in common with all future work, are risky. A sponsor cannot

Towards lmproved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2 be absolutely certain that the anticipated benefits from the project will be fully realized however successfully the project has been carried out. . . Unless risks are recognized they cannot be dealt with. If the risk identification process is to be effective, risk should be seen as arising from any significant threat or area of uncertainty that the sponsor and project manager may face during the life of a project." (BSi, 1996) A recent study of forty years of project management research has identified that 10% of the research papers that have been published on prqject management during that period have been on the subject of risk management. (Kloppenborg and Opfer, 2000). The second construct generally associated with change control is also related to the reduction of risk and the removal of uncertainty from the project. In this sense it is defined as "the process of implementing procedures which ensure that proposed changes are properly assessed and, if approved, incorporated into the project plan. Uncontrolled changes are one of the most common causes of delay and failure." (Project Manager Today, 1997) One of the more recent topics to find its way into the core worldview is that of organisational learning, defined as "the ability of the organisation as a whole to capture knowledge and experience from past projects and apply that to future projects. A relatively new management concept designed to improve the overall performance and responsiveness o f an enterprise and avoid the loss of this information when individual personnel leave the enterprise's employment." (Wideman, 1999) It is a subject that bears significantly on an organisation's ability to manage the uncertainty that is inherent in the project. Every project is to some extent unique. That makes every project a potential learning experience, but it makes it difficult to apply lessons learned on one project to subsequent ones. For this reason, the subject of organisational learning is central to an understanding of project management, even though it is rarely mentioned in project management literature. Even when it is it's character is essentially static and "oncoff', rather like a post-project review. Kharbanda and Stallworthy (1983), for example, analyse sixteen major projects that went seriously wrong, and concluded by learning the same lessons that they had already embodied in earlier work (Kharbanda O.P., Stallworthy, and Williams, 1980) that project plans need to be based on sound estimates.

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2 This difficulty that peoplc have in learning new lessons is well explored by Argyris (1993), who argues that peoplc who arc sr~ccessfuland attain positions of power in an enterprise, are naturally resistant to genuine lcaming because it involves risk, and threatens the very psychological and emotional foundations of their personal achievements. General management literature, on thc other hand, is conducting livcly disc~~ssions about "learning organisations" (e.g.Senge, 1990: de Cieus, 1997) which see learning as a continuous process. There are some recent indications that the significance of organisational learning to prosects (and vice versa) is being recognised, with projects being cited as good vehicles for organisational learning (Yeo, 1993: Bowen et al., 1994). There is also a rccognition of tlie necd to embed continuous learning into the project-based organisation either through systems thinking (Ramsay et. al., 1996) or through some other structured process (Crawford and Price, 1996). I lamilton (1997) recognises the importance of systems thinking to projects and project management, and Senge is perhaps thc most notable publicist for thc discipline of system dynamics (the "Fitth Discipline" of tlie title of his best-sclling management book), which is rapidly becoming recognised as a cornerstone of the "learning organisation". As a discipline, system dynamics is bcginning to be applied to project management for example by Abdel-Hametl and Madnick (1991) who dcvcloped an integrative system dynamics model of software development prqject management, conducted a case study to test the model, and used tlie niodel to study and predict tlie iniplications of an array of managerial policies and procedures in order to investigate the general process by which software development is managed. More broadly, Rodrigues and Bowers (1996) acknowledge the rarity of the application of system dynamics, and suggest that it allows "general strategic lessons" to be "considered when planning tlie project and producing the estimates for the traditional analyses." Specific examples of "hands-on" predictive risk management through tlie use of system ciynaniics models for project simulation have been developed by PughRoberts and described by Cooper. (1993; 1994).

Towards Improved Projecf Management Practice: Chapter 2 Theme 2 (Topic 6): Practices relating to the stages the project will need to pass through Since virtually all definitions of a "project" agree that it is a piece of work with a definite start and finish, it is not surprising that nearly all of the classic project management texts devote ample space to a study of how a project develops during its transitory life - the project life cvcle. It has been argued that it is the life-cycle that gives a projcct its unique characteristics: -

"The primary reason for the co~nplexityof the inzplementation function has to do with the dynamic nature ofsystems. Solutions to complex problems, once decided upon, are not immediately available. ...... The spterm which are the proposed solutions to problem go porn state to state as they eer~ohafronz idea to proposal to.fruition." (Cleland and King, 1983. p. 237.) More generally. however, it is seen as a means of breaking the project up into manageable phases of work. Organisations petfirming projects will usually divide each project into several project phases to provide Better management control and appropriate links to the ongoing operations of the performing organiration. Collectively, the project phases are known as the project life-cycle. (Duncan, 1996, p. I I.) Monis relates the life cycle to the essential skills of a project manager in thc ncw project management environment; a point that he illustrates with nine examples of different life-cycle models.

A crucial skill of the project execzrtive is to move tire project at the appropriote pace thrcnrgh its development cycle, doing the right thing at t/!eright tlme (12ot too won) .... Through carefulplannirzg and # decrnori-niakr~ng.(Morris, 1994, p. 244.)

#

d

Severdl writers (such as Turner (1993); and Duncan (1996)) make the point that different industrics adopt different life cycles that are appropriate to their own particular characteristics, such as defence acquisition, constn~ction,pharmaceuticals or software development. The last-named industry is interesting becausc of the range of radically

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2 different life cycle models that have developed since the early 1980s, and which now co-exist side-by-side. Redmill (1997) points out the strengths and weaknesses inherent in each of the thrce most widely accepted types (waterfall, V and spiral) and urges project managers not to forget or to ignore the approximations and limitations of the particular model they are using. Interestingly, there has been a much greater focus in the literature on the activities connected with the early stages of the project life cycle than with those in the closing stages. Proiect startup, in particular, has been the subject of numerous conferences and articles. On the other hand close-out, ("the completion of work on a project"(Hougham, 2000)), project close-out ("the full completion of a project signed off by all responsible parties and the finalization of all paperwork" (Wideman, 1995)) and hand-over ("the completion of the project to the satisfaction of the sponsor and the introduction of the product or service being delivered by the projectW(Dixon, 2000)) receive scant attention, even though lip-scrviee is paid in most textbooks to their importance. Theme 3: Practices relating to "beneficial change" that the project is intended to accomplish In parallel with the growing recognition of the relevance of project management to many aspects of business life, there has been a growing recognition that project managemcnt is often used as an engine for strategic change. As such, project management can be seen as quintessentially about ma nag in^ change.

Barnes (1990) argues that project management can be defined as the "identification and implementation of beneficial change". Turner agrees: Now, in the 1990s. customers want noiwlty. No one bujdrig a nnw prodtrct wants last year's model. Piwduct de~~elopriterrt tirries and market win do^^.^ are shrinking, requirirrg new prvdtrcts to be intrwcfucedqtiicktv and eflectivelv. Organisations nzusl adopt Jlexihle strlrchn'es to respond to the changing enidronrnent.

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2 In this new environment, all niariagers - either by themelvec or throtcgh teams ofpeople ~lorkirzgfor tlzern - nzust manage change tlir~otrgliprojects. Project-bawd nianagement has become the new general management throtrgh u~liiclioovgnisations respond to change to develop and exploit markets ahead of their competitors, and hence project managemerit is a skill that rill managers need in tlietr portfolio, alongside more traditional disci~~lines. (Ttrrner, 1993: 3-4.) Business Process Re-cnginccring (BPR) is an important discipline for implcnienting transformational change in an organisation. An entire issue of a leading journal (IJPM Vol. 14 No. 6, Deccmber 1996) lias been devoted to different aspects of the rolc that project management can play in BPR. Perhaps this was in response to the apparent indiffcrencc of autlloritative writers on BPR, who seem far from convinced of the significance of project management to their discipline. Two of the most influential books on thc topic (Hammer and Champy, 1993; Davenport, 1993) manage to avoid any mention of prqiect management. In response, Tuman (1996) shows how project management can make a substantial contribution to the success of BPR, providing that the focus is on the right project management practices, but the careful rcadcr of both management literature and project management literature will be struck by the different mental models underlying the two streams of thought.

More generally, Cooke-Davies (1994) highlights the mismatch between the perception of the management of change held by business general managcrs, and that becoming rapidly espoused in the projcct management world. He calls for a constructive dialogue between the two differing points of view, and Partington (1996) calls for a more detailed stud y -of the practices of projcct management as they apply to the management of organisational transformation. The project managenzent literature .shou~sthat, althougli the trend lo~vardsthe use of'a project-based apj~roachto nzanagement is recognised as important, it is not yet well-under~toodand is receiving comparatirwlJqlittle attmtion, portiritlarly bi A e fornz of e~?ipirical reseorch into the practice of the martagenlent of organisational change /~rojects....

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2 111the literahire on tlte management of organisntional change and the implementation ofstrategy there is acknoivledgemmt thnt the princtples ofproject rnanagemenr are appropriate to the nianagernent of strategic and other organisational change. Siiv~pleproject rtranagement moiiels are advocated and some pitfalls di~ctrsred. Ho~'ever,there is (ittle attempt to distingtrisl~betn.een differentniodei~ ofproject nianogerilenf,which are in practice used in difrerent organisational change sittiations and in diJferpnr sectors.' (Pnrtington. I996 p. 20.) This "disconnect of perspectives" becomes apparcnt whcn the corpus of prqjcct management literature is contrasted with general management literature. Thcre appear to be dissimilar mental models informing the thought processes of thc two communities (the project management community and the business management community), and where there are areas of common interest (st~chas the nature of teamwork) this could bc a contributory factor to the misunderstandings that lead to less than optimal projcct performance. Turner & Keegan (1999) offer an interesting hypothesis about this disconnect. One recent study (Wolstenholme, Hendenon, and Gavine, 1993) has drawn attention to the consequences of two different conimunities bcing engagcd on a common task but with dissimilar mental models, and it is reasonable to assume that similar consequences arise in the world of projects in organisations. Projects are conducted by enterprises, so it is important that the elhos, stritctures, processes, systems and policies of the enterprise are supportive of effective project management. In the conclusion of Turner's seminal work on project-based management (Turner, 1993), the first element cited for the profile of success is "align the project with the business". This section looks at those elements of a project manager's worldview that are dedicated to ensuring that the projcct and the business are, indeed. aligned. The topic will be considered under three headings: Topics relating to the implementation of business strategy. Topics relating to the definition, quantification and harvesting of organisational benefits as a result of implcmcnting the project.

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2 Topics relating to the allocation of organisational resources. Topic 7: Projects a s a means ofimplementing business strategy Within the worldview of a project managcr, two rather different constructs are vying for supremacy in terms of how an organisation relates the management of projects to the implementation of business strategy. These two constructs, management bv nroiects and programme management, are not mutually exclusive, but they apply different degrees of integration. The most integrative approach is known as management by projects. As project management has spread beyond the traditional industries in which it first took root, so there has been an increase in the amount of writing about "management by projects" or the "project-based organisation". Indeed, the IPMA'S~biennial conference in Vienna in 1990 was entitled "management by projects", and it set the scene for much of the subsequent debate about projects. Lhie to dynartlic markets, new environmental and technological developments and changes in paradigm con~panieshave to cope with new challenges and potentials (sic) from the business environntent. In order to deal with an increasing business complexity companies use projects as organisation form to perform unique and complex tasks. (Gareis. 1990, p. 35.) Gareis argues that this has implications for the structure and culture of the project-oriented company, for project management, and for the management of the whole network of projects. Turner (1 993) goes into greater detail, and spells out not only the need to change the organisation, but also the process by which a kind of project he refers to as " P S O (for people, systems and organisation) can transform the organisation itself. Hamilton (1997) agrees, and develops his whole framework for thinking about projects out of the three themes of management by projects, managing change and systems thinking. This is echoed, to an extent, in general business writing. One enthusiastic believer in the applicability of project management to the wliolc of business life is Tom Peters.

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2

1

Argtrah!~,project work was the norm before the industrial revohrtion. Most activities took place in small, independent sliaps, and croft and croftsriretz were tlte eronorny S centrepiece. The ~ndzrstrialreinltrtion chanxed all that. Skrlls and tasks were narrou,ed. And narrou~ed trgain Thousantis ofpeople uent to iror-k rmder tlie ronte roof. Now, tliattb to new competith~epressurer, nelv divtrihtr/ii,einfornto lion technologie~and the like, we are, argtmblv, rettrniing to the craft tradition. Tire essence of craft i c the project. It ntajl tlrrrt out tlrnt tlie 1.70 jenr:vfr-on~the time of Dickens to I980 i ~ ~ ihave l l heen the anorria[19. Whot j. norntnl, an tlzejob or olf: will end tip being crafi, learning, adding i~olire- i.e. tlie project. (Peters, 1992, p. 222.) More typical, perhaps, is the approach taken in a series of articles in Harvard Business Review (Bowen et al., 1994) which stress the importance of development projects firstly to an organisation's ability to renew itself and introduce new products, and secondly as a school for developing organisational leaders. The less all-embracing approach to implementing business strategy is proeranimc management. The tern1 "progranlnle (or program) management" has its mots in the construction and aerospace industries (Archibald, 1992) and has been used with a variety of meanings at least since the 1950s, when it was used to describe the acquisition of defence systems (Morris, 1994).

Tlte idea ? f a program is not precisely defined, because it mztsl be given a someu~haidifferent interpretation irt d!ffernt or-gani,~ations. Progrants are closelj) related to the objectives o f tlie or~anisation.In .fact, it is because the objectives o f large orgunisations irre ?fie11 difticttlt to define that no single definition o f a program is soti.rfactot:\. (Clelund and King, 1983. p. 162.) As project management has moved from its traditional roots into a more central place in the strategic thinking and management of organisations. so programme management is receiving increased attention. Turner (1993) describes how programmes of work emerge from tlie business planning process. and how each programme can give rise to multiple projects. Together with Speiser (Turner and Speiser. 1992) he also shows that programme management calls for different infonnation

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2 systcms and control systems than projects. Action research into a major European telecommunications study (Pellegrinelli, 1997) draws attention to the differences between three different "configurations" of programmes, which he refers to as portfolio, goal-oriented and lieartbcat. Portfolio programmes are only loosely related, are driven by the need to utilise resources efficiently and to leverage existing knowledge or skills. Goal-oriented programmes are groups of related projects that together seek to deliver a single major business benefit (as discussed above under "managcmcnt of change"). Heartbeat programmes are groups of related projects that enable the regular and incremental improvement of business systems, infrastructure or processes. These classifications seem to represent a helpful advance on less structured or more theoretical attempts to classify programmes, e.g. (Ferns, 1991); (Gray, 1997). The proiect context plays an important part in determining just which elements of the project manager's worldview will require attention. For example in organisations that are operating essentially as suppliers, whereby the business as a whole can be seen as a collection of projects, the question of & and marketing of projects forms an important element in the implementation of thc organisation's strategy. Thus, thcsc two topics occur as core elements in the project managers' worldview. Topic 8: Defining, quantifying and harvesting oganisationalbenefits as a result of canying out the project. The term "benefits management" is a relative newcomer to the project manager's vocabulary. Many classic texts make no direct mention of the subject (e.g.Cleland and King, 1983; Moms, 1994; Kerzncr, 1998b), and BS6079 ((BSi, 1996)) is silent on the topic. Following Turner (1 993) the definition of a project adopted in this thesis includes the recognition that the product or service being created or modified by a project has as its purpose "beneficial change". By implication, the only reliable means of testing whether this has been delivered or not is to measure the benefits that accmc. Benefits management, therefore, can be defined as "the identification of potential benefits, their planning and tracking, the assignment of responsibilities and their actual realisation." (CCTA, 1994, p. 1 .)

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2 This oniission from the sphere of attention for project managcrs bcgs the question of whether this is simply another case of the differing worldviews of general managers and project managers. Support for this view would appear to come from a series of "guidelines written for CEOs and thcir management teams" about the procurement of information systems (The BuylT Best Practice Group, 1996). Two of the eleven published guidelines - those dealing with planning and ensuring delivery of business benefits - are annotated "This Guideline is primarily for the CEO and the Board. It would appear, however, that key elements of this message are missing their mark. A recent study into the implementation of new, coniplex soflware packages concluded that:the sheer dificulty and complexity of undertaking large package inlplententation projects and nroking the associated husmes~citanges is such tltat all-too-often the business benefits that were sotight are not obtained. ... ..... whrlst 89% of respondents clainted their projects were Sttccessful'or 'higldy successful :only a quarter had acaral(v obtained and quantified all the planned benefits. (KPMG, 1997) At the heart of the concept of benefits management lies the business

case - "a document that dcfincs why the project is required and what the change is to be. It should include an outline of the projcct's objcctivcs, deliverables, time, cost, technical, safety, quality and other performance requircments, and the major project risks and upside opportunities. It might also include information on the competitive impact, resource requirements, organisational impacts, key performance indicators and critical success factors of the project and its outcome. The project's sponsor, the person responsible for defining and developing the project against the business case, should 'own' the business case." (Morris, 1999) Proiect a~oraisalis "the discipline of calculating the viability of a projcct. Project viability is normally determined in largely econoniic or financial terms. However. it is normally extended to include issues such as environment appraisal and certainty of performance." (Projcct Manager Today, 1997) As such, together with the business case, it lays down the foundations for expectations of the benefits that a project is designed to accomplish.

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2

In theory, therefore, the success of a project is decided primarily upon the extent to which it delivers the benefits. The KPMG report quoted above (KPMG, 1997), howcvcr, raises the suggestion that this is far from typically the case. Managers apparently judge prqjects to be successful on grounds other than the measured and verified benefits that they deliver. Perhaps this is less surprising than it sounds. In the papcr previously cited, De Wit (1988) suggested that the whole issue of measuring the success of projects is "so complex as to be virtually impossible." Certainly, even ~vhcrcthere are apparently straightforward goals, such as profit maximisation, secondary goals such as reputation (for example through donating money to charity) may play their part. There is the additional complication that because objectives are often vaguely stated the relationships between the organisation's activities and its objectives are seldom precisely understood. Another way in which the measures of project success are dealt with by implication rather than explicitly in the literature, is by grouping thc whole discussion together under "project goals" or "projcct objectives". This is the assumption undcrlying project management self-measuring tools such as the pmject implementation profile (Pinto, 1990), which includes both the 'softer' behavioural elements of project management, as well as issues that Pinto has previously identified as being strategically important in ensuring project success (defined as achievement of the project objectives or goals). Turner (1993) dedicates a whole section of his book to "Managing the Project Objectives", with separate chapters on scope, project organisation, quality, cost, time, risk and structuring the plans. In this final chapter, Turner recognises that frequently the five objectives will be in conflict with each other, and advocates clarity about which takes precedence. Whcthcr such clarity can be obtained, or not, begs further questions about the ability of an organisation to articulate and prioritisc the project objectives, in view of its "vaguely-statcd" organisational objectivcs. The final element of the project manager's worldview relating to benefits management is the post-proiect evaluation review. This is "an important review of project perfomlance and lessons that can he derived from the project [that is] conducted once operations have started. Although often considered only after completion of the project,

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2 in practice project evaluation can and should be a fully integral part of the project. Similar reviews should therefore also be carried out periodically during the course of the project, with the resultant information/lessons fed back into this and other projects." (Moms, 1999) Topic 9: Allocating oganisationalresources to the project Projects require resources of all kinds in order to manitfacti~reand cieliver the products or services for which they have bccn cstablishcd. Resource olanning and resource management, as have been discussed abovc, are two major concerns in planning and organizing the work to be done. The key elements of the project manager's worldview that bear most closely on this topic, however, concern money and people. Depending upon a successful proiect appraisal, finance will be providcd by the "owner" of the project, in the expectation of receiving some retorn from the product or service (see the discussion about uncertainty above). People will be allocated, both in terms of committed individuals and organisational units, including, primarily, the project manager. The method by which resources are allocated will depend partly on how the organisation chooses to implement business strategy (applying tcchniques such as programme management see above), and partly on the organisational structure (see below). -

People aspects will be considered niorc fully below, but a great deal of the litetilture of project tilanagenlent focuses on the role of the project managcr. and the skills, attributes or other competencies that s h e needs to possess. Theme 4: Practices relating to the people that are associated with the enterprise Up to this point in dcscribing the "praxis" of a project manager, the emphasis has been on techniques, practices and concepts - what tlicy are and why they are important. The final area to he described, however, is arguably the most important of all - being concerned with the "people" who will actually cause die project to come into being, and who will then carry out all the work necessary to deliver the product or services.

These are basically two separate groups of people: -

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2 the "stakeholders" who not only bring the project into being, but to a large extent dictate the environment within which it is complcted, and the temporary team that is brought together to undertake the work. Before writing about these two sections, however. perhaps a something should be noted about the most prominent member of the tcmporary team the project manager. The classic understanding of the importance of a project manager's job was set out in Gaddis's groundbreaking Harvard Business Review article (Gaddis, 1959), which emphasises the need for a project manager to be competent with both the technical and the managerial aspects of the project that sihe is managing. A more recent understanding develops this a little further:-

C

Tlie project manager's role is to create a product. In doing so they hale a itarzage tun pmcesyes: the process to produce the product, and the process to rnnnage the production of the product (Hamilton, 1997, p. 212.) Gaddis described the "qualifications that a successful project manager [of high technology projccts] must possess" as a background in a hightechnology, a broad working knowledge of many fields of science, a good understanding of general management problems, and a strong, continuous active interest in developing his supervisors. There is a relationship between the qualities of a project manager and the success of the projcct and so the topic is of more than a passing interest. There is, however, niuch work still to be done. An analysis of 29 North American publications dating from 1959 to 1990 (Pcttersen, 1991) concludes that although there are trends in skills that emerge, the topic is held back by flaws in the methodological approaches of most researchers and writers. This accusation cannot be levelled at Gadeken (1994) whose papcr is based on a thorough piece of research covering project managers in the defence industry, and demonstrates that six particular competencies mark out outstanding project managers from both their competent colleagues, and successful line managers:-

*

Sense of ownershipimission Political awareness

Towards Improved Pmject Management Practice: Chapter 2

Relationship development Strategic influence Interpersonal assessment and Action orientation. Gadeken shows how difficult it is to assess these competencies reliably, and points to the need to develop and to calibrate suitable assessment instruments, and it is interesting to observe that assessment centres are one method that is gaining increased acccptance (Gystad and Kuvas, 1994). The lnternational Project Management governing bodies are making significant strides towards establishing an internationally recognised framework of qi~alifications for project managers (Turner, 1996; Caupin et al., 1999). This is closely related to the topic of training project managers. Some innovative action-based training programmes (e.g.Crawford and Price, 1996) involving partnerships between industry and academia are being tested and the problems of career progression (Hamilton, 1997) and the threat of professional obsolescence (Rutland, 1996) are both being considered. AAer these introductory words, it is possible to move on to consider the two topics that make up the fourth and final theme in a prqject manager's worldview. Topic 10: IdentQng and aligning the interests of the project "stakeholders': Who the stakeholders of any project are likely to be depends primarily on the oraanisation structure. Projects are undertakcn by cntcrpriscs in order to produce a new or improved product or service. It follows that the organisation structure of the enterprise that i s undertaking the projects is an important part of the project's envimnment, and will have a significant influence not only on the stakcl~oldcrs.but also on the project manager and other project personnel.

There is an apparent divergence between the focus of writing by organisational theorists such as Handy (1976), Morgan (1986) and Mintzberg (1989), and the approach taken by writers on project management. The former emphasis the adaptation of organisations to

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2 their purpose, and relate the cultures, systems and structures to the organisation's situation and environment.

Every organized human activity -ji.onz the making ofpottery to the placing of a man on the moon --gives rise to two fundarnental and opposing requirements: the division of labour into various t a s l ~to be pe$ormed and the co-ordination ofthose tasks to accomplish the activity. The structure of an organisation can be defined simply as the total ofthe ways in which its labour is divided into distinct tasks and then its co-ordination achieved among those tasks. (Mintzberg, 1989, p. 100.) Morgan points out the influence of the underlying mental modcls on our thinking about organisational structure:

When we talk about organisation we usually have in mind a state of orderly relations between clearly defined parts that have some deternrinate order. Although the image may not be explicit, we are talking about a set of mechanical relations. We talk about organisations as if they were machines, and as a consequence we tend to expect them to operate as nrachines: in a routinised, eficient, reliable and predictable way. (Morgan, 1986, p. 22.) In contrast to this emphasis on the fundamentals underlying organisation structure, classic discussions in project management literature concentrate on the influence of different structures on the project manager. Many, for example, compare the degree and nature of authority that a project manager is granted in different types of organisation - o f t e n using a typology of organisations that envisages a "spectrum" from functional organisations, through matrix organisations to pure project organisations. A good example of this discussion is taken from Cleland and King:

Authority in the project environment flow.^ horizontally, diagonally and vertically. Technical competence, per.vuasion, negotiation, reciprocity, alliances, and the resolution of deliberate conflict are some ofthe means that project managers use to alcgment their legal autlrority to accomplish project objectives. Thus, the effective authority ofproject managers is political as well as hierarchical.

Towards Improved Project Management Pracfice: Chapter 2 Conflict in a matri.~organisation is intensified Iqr the prqject:firnctiorral interface. Such confict, properfy managed, can.faci1itate the decision process in the management of the project. D(fferences ofopinion in thepr~ject~fimctiorial conflict can trltirrrale~ be resolved by the conrmon line s~rpe~visor; houve~rr,thepacgram manager j.9 and tIre,fitnctionalmanager's credibilitv will r~ltimatelybe reduced by continued use of this alternati~~e. (Cleland arid King, 1983, p. 345.) More recently, as many organisations have adopted flatter hierarchies and more decentralised structures, and matrix management has become a de facto norm, articles and papers have addressed thc specific challenges faced by project managers in these new organisational forms, c.g. (Selin, 1991 ; Robins, 1993) One insight into the different approaches is offered by Parkin (1996), who suggests that the decision-making processes of project managers are different from those embedded within the norms of most organisations. There appears to be more to it than this, however, and the theme of miscommunication between enterprise management and project management is one that will recur in this thesis. A second influence on the pro,ject stakeholders is the organisatiotial

"culture". The 1980s saw an outpouring of management writings on the subject of culture, with the runaway success of In Search o f E.ree//ence (Peters and Waterman, 1982) illustrating the extent to which the genre touched the hcarts of the management community. Theve authors have concentrated on wltat n~iglitbe called the "behavioural side of managemenl and organisatic~n. They have argued that tlie diffrence hetween srccressft~land not-yo-successfill organi~ationsrests wtth tlie values and principles that tinderlie their lrrternal organisation . . . "

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2 Organiratiorml ctrlture is the term that has come to comprise this set of hehaviournl variables tllat hats drawn so much attention. "Culttire" refes to the underlq.ing belief, values andprinciples that serve as a founo'ntron for an organisations nlanagenzent systenz as well as the set o f manager~tentpracticesand beltaviours that both e.xemfipl$i and reinforce those basic principles. (Denison, 1990, p. I.) The culture of an organisation, therefore, exerts a strong influence on all thc members of the organisation who are undertaking projects in or for it. This was recognised in the 1990 World Congress on Project Management, where one of the four main groi~psof topics was "Culture and Project Management". The twin messages to emerge from this and subsequent literature are firstly if the culture is unhelpful then it is important to change it and secondly, that irrespective of whether culture helps or hinders, "the effects of culture must be considered throughout the project." (Turner, 1993). Firstly, if the culture is unhelpful to the achievement of project goals, then the project may need to make some attempt to influence the culture for the better (Haalien, 1994), although this may not be simple (CookeDavies, 1990). Cleland and King (1983) illustrate well how certain aspects of corporate culture, notably the attitude and practices of senior managers, militate against the effectiveness of the planning process. With regard to the need to consider the effects of culture, this will pervade all aspects of the project. The leadership style of a project manager needs to be adapted to the organisational culture (Maylor, 1996). The practices for managing people on the project team will he governed by the company's HR practices (Fabi and Pettersen, 1992), while the nature of projccts and the potentially adversarial relationships bctwccn different organisations that are party to a contract is likely to create a culture of conflict and stress (Sommewillc and Langford, 1994). The impact of an adversarial relationship on cost in the construction industry is well illustrated in a survey of 262 projects, which shows a clear correlation between high trust and low cost, and between low trust and high cost (Construction Industry Institute, 1993a).

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2 The most widely described practice relating to the management of stakeholders is communication, with its associated discipline of information management, A specific set of practices related to one group of stakeholders is industrial relations, defined as "a broad area of responsibility within an organisation that includes human resources management activities and the administration of union agreements and seeks to maintain a positive image for the organisation through public relations type activities." (Wideman, 1999) More generally, the project manager needs to be familiar with all relevant aspects of personnel management. Neeotiation is invariably required of the project manager, as diffcrcnt stakeholders are likely to be pursuing different organisational and personal goals that will need to be harmonized if the project is to succeed. This topic is closely related to the topic of beneficial change, described above. Topic 1I: Creating, leading and managing the temporary team who will cany out the project. Looking "inwards", as it were, rather than "outwards", the project manager's second "people" focus is concerned with the prqject team itself. For this reason, teamwork is a prominent element of the project manager's worldview. Both the PMI and the APM' havc recently published "bodies of k n o w ~ e d g e " ~ 1995; ( ~ ~ ~Duncan, , 1996) that cmphasise how important human resource management skills are to a project manager. This is gcncrally assumed to consist of techniques and skills for acquiring the right staff to work on a project. organising them effectively. communicating with all parties, developing teamwork, delegating as appropriate, exercising leadership, managing conflict, conducting negotiations and developing individuals. Following the PMI PMBOK, Hamilton (1997) points out also that human resource management includes the processes required to make the most effective use of the people involved with the pro,ject. Tliere is a recognition of the value of good teamwork in delivering successful projects, irrespective of the form of conimercial contract (Constmction Industry Institute, 1993b; Bucero, 1994) and of the damage to project performance that rcsults from poor teamwork (Mansfield and Odeh, 1991). Other writers note how big the gulf can

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2 be between theory and practice (Gabriel, 1991), and how many projects fall short of good practice (Tampoe and Thurloway, 1993). Many lexts emphasise both the need to maintain good relationships and cffcctive communications with the "client", e.g. (Kliem and Ludin, 1992: Vernia. 1995), and there is some recognition tliat human resource management is not an activity alongside other activities, but rather a component of how virtually every project management activity is camed out (Kliem and Ludin, 1992). As has bccn noted above, writing about teams in the management literature seems to be more advanced than that in tlie project management literature. In management literaturc there is a clear recognition that teamwork depends upon subtle diqciplines such as "team learning" (Scngc, 1990) tliat have hardly reached the project management literature. In their introduction to "The Wisdom of Teams", (Katzenhach and Smith, 1993) comment on this:IVhat this hook has to say is 1~0thohviou.~and subtle. Manj~people recognrse the ohviotr~ahoiit teamy. For exainple the ebnients of our defirirtion are ohi~iorrs.But the d~sciplinethey inrpIy is not. Moreo~~er, each elemerlt has a11 ohvrous nieuning. But each element alvo has more srihtle iniplicotio~u And finally, it is obvioits that teams otrtperforn~ indivitfiials We ha1.e I-escarchedand written thrs hook, however, becotrye it t y not ohvious liovv top management can best exploit that adi~antage. Gadeken has recognised this difference of emphasis (Gadeken, 1996), and pointed out that with an increasing emphasis in the project management world on the creation of multi-functional interorganisational teams in such practices as partnering or alliancing there are significant implications on tlie training and development of project tcams. There is also some recognition in the literature of project management about the tendency towards "self-directed teams" that have been favoured in management practice increasingly since the mid-1980s. Kczsbom, indeed, picks up both on the theme of subtlety and that of self-directed teams when she writes: -

Towards lmproved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2

Tlteoretical!~, there "self-directed" teanir ... ntnnnge themre/r3e~. I4nitv. In fact, are carrying out the rev~~onsihilities and ohligations that in the decade p l o r defirted the project niaiingcr 'T role A s orgnnisahons continue to adopt a more 'Self-directed" teant hayed approach, a closer e.vamination of tlteproject inanager's role 1.7 needed. (Kezsbont, 1994, p. 589.) As has been observed above, one specific aspect of the project team that receives a great deal of attention is the prqjcct manager hcrsclf. "It seems to be accepted in the field that project managers, who evolve in a context made more difticult by the variety and complexity of its of its characteristics - a context characterized by disorder, ambiguity and disjunction between formal authority and responsibility - need to develop skills different from those of thcir colleagues in functional management. Consequently, it becomes extremely important for the organisation to take these particular requirements into account when selecting a manager who will be able to bring his or her projects to a successful conclusion." (Pettersen, 1991, p. 2 1.) The literature contains much about proiect oreanisation and owinisation design. "Organisation" IS a word with a broad rangc of mcanrngs, but in this context it is taken rather narrowly to mean the structural charactcristics of the roles and relationships between different people and groups of people who make up the project "team", in its broadest sense (i.e. including line managers in the enterprise with wliotn project personnel need to interface). Most writers accept that there is a need for a project manager as a single point of authority, either implicitly, e.g. (Cleland & King. 1983; Turner, 1993; Hamilton. 1997), or explicitly (Morris, 1994: Gabriel. 1997). As was mentioned above9 most of the debate in literature is about the diffcring charactcr~sticsand relative merits of fi~nctional,matrix and pmject-based organisatiotis, and the influence of organisation shucture on the project manager's authority, e.g. (Cleland and King, 1983: Jovanovic, 1994; Morris, 1994). There is general agreement that the form of organisation chosen plays an important part in determining project success and that the chosen form of organisation shoitld be selected for its appropriateness to the particular project (e.g.Hamilton, 1997). Hence the recognition of organisation design, which is defined as "the design of the most

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2 appropriate organisation for a project, including definitions of roles and responsibilities of the participants. The five basic kinds of structure are: ~unctional , coordination -, Balanced , Seconded, and , Project Matrix."(Project Manager Today, 1997) Clearly, the softer skills already described above such as leadership and conflict management. and practices such as integration feature prominently in the ability focns the team's efforts on the work that is necessary to deliver the product or service.

2.5

A systemic view of the project manager's worldview

Implicit in the prior discussion connecting the elements of the project manager's worldvicw, is a set of systemic relationships. The sixty elements have been found to cluster together naturally and logically into eleven "topic" headings, and the relationships between thcm can be shown diagrammatically as follows:-

Figure 6 is an important figure. It shows all eleven topics with equal emphasis in a single diagram. There is a logical cause and effect sequence built into the relationships that can be modelled using system dynamics, and that can lead to an understanding of the dynamic behaviour of organisations as they grapple with a multitude of projects,

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2 each performing differently both from plan, and from what is necessary to support the corporate strategy. Each of the eleven topics are shown here in relationship to each other, and all are important to success. But what happens whcn success is less than complete? In reality projects often fail to accomplish their goals (as was shown in Chapter 1. and is implicit in the growth of the nuinher of people who arc explicitly involved in project management) and to deliver the benefits that are expected of them. Thus, a more complete diagram of the systemic relationships is that shown in Figure 7.

Figure 7: Gaps in fire systen~ic~uorldvie~v.

The missing "piece" is the divergence between actual (or anticipated) benefits, and the desired benefits on wliich the project was initially predicated. Depending on a number of factors, the control loop that seeks to take appropriate action to adjust the system in view of the gap might flow through the project team (in which case it is likcly to be covered, in the project manager's worldview, by change control), or it might flow through the stakctiolders into the whole system. in ~ ~ h i c t i case it is less controllable by the project manager. Under these circumstanccs, the behaviour of the system could well become much less predictable. In effect, this addition moves the view of projcct management away from first-order cybernetics to second-order cybernetics. (See Figurc 8)

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2 First-Order Cybernetics Extrinsic Control

Second-OrderCybernetics Intrinsic Control

C~ntmllerl Manager

Figure 8: First- and second-order cybernetics (Schwaninger, 1997)

In first-order cybernetics concepts such as feedback, information exchange, control, regulation and equilibrium play an important part. In second-order cybernetics, the multitude of individual perspectives, the observer that in principle cannot be detached from the system and the concept of self-reference, are of central significance. Heinn von Foerster, the pioneer of a new systems view, defined first-order cybernetics as thc "cybernetics of observed systems", and second-order cybernetics as the "cybernetics of observing systems". (Schwaninger, 1997: 130-131)

2.5.1

Correlations of empirical research with the systemic worldview.

In terms of "closing the loop" on this chapter, the final piece of work remains to compare the worldview with its implicit cause and effect with the findings of thc three sets of empirical research considered at the start of the Chapter. The findings are summarised in Table 4.

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2

I Worldview I Baker et. al. I Pinto & Slevin I Lechler I

I. Pmjcct strategy

I

2. Pmject Goals

I

I

Goal commitment. Good cost estimates. Clear success criteria.

Project mission.

Planning & control.

Schedulelplans. Monitoring & feedhitck.

I Goal changes.*

3. Product 01 senrice

4. Pmject work. 5. Inherent Uncertainty

Trooble-shooting.

6. Life cycle stages

Few start-up problems.

7. Strategic change

1 8. Benefits

Project mission.

I

I Adequate funding.'

10. Stakeholders I

I I . Telnporary team

Adequate capability. Task orientation. On-site pmjcct nigr.

I

I

Top nip~nt support.' Technical tasks.

Top mgmt.*

Client consultation. Client acceptance.* Comnionication.

Conflicts. laformation/ communication.

Permnnel.

Project leadcr. Project teani. Participation.

Table 4: Critical Sttccess F a c l o r . ~Related 10 Worldvie~v pics

There are four points o f particular interest about this table. Firstly, three of the eleven items are not identificd as relating to spccific success factors. Two of them ("benefits" and "product or service") are

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2

perhaps to do with the traditional distinction betwecn the role of the project manager (manage the project to deliver the product) and that of top management (evaluate which new products or services to invest in) or operations management (operate the product or service to deliver business benefits). The other, however ("project strategy") is less easy to explain. and warrant further investigation, particularly in the light of Miller and Hobbs detailcd study of 60 mega projects, which identified alternative "trajectories" (a term encompassing both project strategy and life cycle stages) as the critical determinant of the successful completion of the project. (Miller and Hobbs, 2000) It also appears to fly in the face of evidence collected by the European Centre for Advanced Project and Construction Management (EPCI)." Secondly, the single factor associated with the project's inherent uncertainty is one that flies in the face of much recent writing. Risk management, which accounted for 12% of the journal articles written between 1984 and 1998 a proportion that increascd significantly during the period from 1994 to 1998, has as its purpose almost the opposite of Yrouble-shooting". As has been seen above, risk management is about proactively identifying threats to the project, and putting in place contingency or containment actions so that “trouble-shooting" will not be necessary. Could it be that this factor would no longer feature so prominently in organizations that have instituted good risk management practices? Thirdly, there is a general tenor to Table 4 that sccms to betray a hidden aspect to the project managcr's worldview - one that is dificult to spell out in a sufficiently nuanced manner, and yet one that is leading to a sense of frustration in the academiclpractitioner debate about the future of project management at the start of the third millennium of the present era. It has to do with the management of boundaries. Taken in conjunction with the missing elements that are revealed in Figure 7, this might suggest that project management should concern itself with the whole systcm of projects, and not simply those elements that have been traditionally considered the project manager's areas orresponsibility. The impression that comes across is almost one of, "If I am to do 11ly job properly, then it is important that my project is set up for success by the people who control my external environment - senior management and the clients." No fewer than six of the 28 identified factors could be interpreted in this way (and they have been indicatcd in Table 6 with an

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2 asterisk). l f this is correct, then the implication is that project managers interpret their influence and responsibility in a "bounded" way, which leaves responsibility for strategy implementation to others in the organisation. It begs the question of whether this is the appropriate way to maximize the benefits. Fourthly, there appcars to be a mismatch between the research findings on critical success factors, and the hypothesized relationships between the eleven topics that constitute the project manager's worldview." The third and fourth factors are those that hold most promise for fi~rther investigation since, if it is found to be correct, then a recognition of the importance of the currently "neglected" elements of the worldview could lead to a fresh dialogue between the project management community, the gcncral management community and the operations management community.

2.6

How can the search be conducted for improved project management practice?

From the foregoing discussion, it can be suggested that the present worldview of a project manager acknowledges a number of explicit practices that are critical to project management success, and can substantiate their importance through a number of empirical research studies. On the other hand, there are practices implicit in the worldview, particularly those that relate to boundary conditions with other members of the management community and to the behaviour of the whole system when performance deviates from plan, that have becn neither validated nor disproved through empirical research. This could be because of the limited focus at the centre of a project manager's attention (managing the specific project), and the fiagmented manner in which other important elements of the worldview have been dealt with in the literature. The task facing the academic project management community, therefore, appears to be firstly to identify theory that might account for both the empirically validated results, and also the "blind spots", and secondly to provide empirical results that shed light on thc wholc field covcrcd by the project manager's worldview. Such theory is most unlikely to be a "grand unified theory of projects". It is much more

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2 likely to consist of helpful "clusters of ideas" that apply in specific contexts to some kinds of projects. The work on identifying such theory has been started from a number of directions - notably Turner and Keegan from the point of view of classic management theory (Turner and Keegan, 1999), Lundin and othcrs from the point of view of organisation theory (Lundin and Stablein, 2000), Thomas and others from the point of view of organisational learning (Thomas and Tjider, 2000), and Richardson and others from the point of view of complexity theory (Richardson, Lissack and Roos, 2000). Although not directly related to project management, Wolstenholme's work on system dynamics offers a valuable insight on boundary issues. (Wolstenholme, Henderson, and Gavine, 1993). The work on which this thesis is based consists of ongoing action rcscarch that seeks to make advances in both theory, and the provision of appropriate empirical results.

2.7

Conclusion

This Chapter has reviewed the corpus of project management literature, and extracted from it a narrative account of the way a project managcr views the world. 4 themes and 11 topics have been identified that describe the salient features ofthis worldvicw. Empirical research into the factors that lead to project success have providcd evidence of the importance of seven of the eleven topics, while being silent on four others, and surprisingly muted on a fifth. It has been suggested that the reasons for this lie in the self-imposed limitations of thc way that many project managers interpret their role with rcspect to implementing strategic change in an organisation and specifically in defining their relationships with other members of the management community too narrowly. The need has been identified both for theories that explain this shortcoming, and for empirical evidence covcring those "blind spots" within the worldview. The remainder of this thesis will concentrate on the empirical evidence how it can be gathered, how it can be validated, and what it shows.. The next chapte~,Chapter 3, will review the epistemological and methodological considerations that must be made in order to have a sound research approach to such a broad topic, and Chapter 4 will

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2 describe the programme o f action research that has been being pursued since the beginning o f 1994.

I Bowker & Leigh Star (1999) demonstrate very convinciiigly the pervasive influence that classification systems and the associated infrastmctore have on all aspects of life today, and this is applicable to the world of projects as to any other. Under tlie name of OLC (Operational Level Coordination). this was the second workshop attended by more than 30 practitioners and academics who collectively represent the continuing work on "bodies of project management knowledge" being undertaken by the projcct management professional associations from around the world. The first was in June 1999 in Norfolk, Virginia. Lists of delegates at both workshops, and the timetable for each as attached in Appendix P-2. 3 See appendix P-2 for more details. Earned Value is based on assigning a value to tlic achievement of project work. Ideally, achievement is in terms of milestone and deliverables. The value is usually monetary but can be expressed in any appropriate units such as man hours. The value to be earned when a specific milestone is achieved is based on the planned cost of achieving the milestone. Thus, for example, if the plan showed that f50.000 was required to achieve milestone X. £50,000 wotlli of earned value wo~rldbe credited to the task owner whcn achicvcmcnt of milestone X was demonstrated. (BS6079: 1996) Partington's conclusion is similar to that which led to this research being undertaken. liitcmational Project Management Association. the international body that coordinates the national project management associations. formerly known as "internet" until tlie term became common coinage for the "information superhighway". The Project Management Institute and the Association for Project Manageiiieiit are tlie USA's and UK's National project management associations respectively. PMl's document is consciously entitled "A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge': since it acknowledges that a single docunicnt can never contain the entire Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK). See the section ahove on corporate organisation structure. lo I am indebted to Per Willy Hetlund for a copy of his recent paper (Iietl~md, 2000)

'

'

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 2

'I Additional evidence for this has been provided very recently by the growing degree of interest on the part of members of the networks in "benefits management", "programtnc nianagetnent"and "portfolio management". All of these topics have to do with the interface between thc project manager and other influential stakeholders.

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 3

3: Research methods and underlying theory. This chapter is the most abstract in a piece of research that has essentially practical aims. It is also, in many ways. the most important chapter in the thesis. As Chaptcr 2 showed. the literature about prqicct management concerns itself with fleshing out a usefill worldview much more so than it does with examining the effectiveness of the worldview using academic and critical tools. Drawing on modern trends in epistemology, the fundamental issues about knowledge are examined as they apply to both thc natural and the social sciences. Both the positivist (or post positivist) paradigm on the one hand and the constructivist (or postmodern or relativist) paradigm on the other are shown to be inadequate tools for the task of critically identifying and correcting the inadequacies in the currently-prevailing worldview about projects.

In order to establish a method that embraces both of these philosophical paradigms and that is backed up by a suitable episten~ology,the ideas of three rcpresentative thinkers from different spheres of study are brought together. What they havc in conlmon is that each occupies the "centre of the philosophical spectrum", and each dcals with a diffcrcnt aspect of theory that is necessary to arrive at a well-grounded method. The three elements are the theory of knowledge proposed by Michael Polanyi. the epistemic procedures considered by John Rawls, and the hermeneutic approach developed by Hans-Cieorg Gadarner. Each suggests different and complementary considerations for the development of a research methodology that might lead to practical iriiprovetnents in project management practice. The method is rooted in practice through the intimate involvement of a global project management "connnunity of practice". An innovative pragmatic research method is described that consists of seven essential components (described Section 4.6) and that contains within itself an iterative and flexible research cycle (illustrated in Figure

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 3 12). The cycle itself constitutes a rigorous method of enquiry into the prevailing project management worldview, which takes account of the fundamcntal cpistemic and ~ilethodologicalquestions discussed earlier. The participants in the research are all practitioners of project management who are operating within the prevailing project management worldview, and who share a perception that it is capable of improvement.

3.2

Fundamental research issues of philosophy, knowledge, reality and language.

As has been seen in Chapter 2, the largest part of the literature about project management, as well as the thrust of the world's project management professional associations, is devoted to fleshing out and justifying a particular worldview. The challenge facing any research programme such as this one, is to dctcrmine the appropriate research method to adopt when conducting a rigorous investigation into a topic as complex as the nature of practices that can help to reduce the high social and economic cost of project failure. It is necessary to look for a coherent grounding for the research into improved project management practices in part because "project management'' lacks a "home" in the academy. Many of the techniques and practices are taught in Engineering dcpartrnents, and so some research originates there. Business schools and departments of management science also touch on project management, but project managers are not, as yet, recognised by many outside the global community of project management practitioners, and the traditional areas of project management practice (such as engineering, construction, defence and aerospace) as being a "real" part of the organisation structure at a senior level. Projects don't have a home, but everybody does them. They are a bit like breathing - something everybody does at a sub-conscious level. Goals are created, decisions are taken to pursue the goals, and people are sent off to implement the resulting project or programme. Since thc war, and increasingly during the 1980s and 1990s (Kloppenborg and Opfer, 2000), practitioners of prqject management have sought to raise projects from the sub-conscious and intuitive to the conscious level as they have become more complex and more important, and as the social

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 3 and economic consequences of failure have become more serious for business. For this reason, there is an urgent need not simply to advocate more and more sophisticated techniques and practices, but to develop a corresponding body of theory, validated by empirical research that has been carried out using an appropriate methodology or methodologies. Prqject management is, as has been shown in Chapter I , a social construct involving a particular way of seeing a particular enterprise undertaken by a particular group of people. As such, it belongs firmly in the domain of social science rather than of science. On the other hand, many of the products produced by projects employ either the hard sciences (e.g. in the construction of a space probe) or technologies directly derived from the hard sciences (c.g. in the construction of a new building). This means that the realm of project management encompasses both social science and science, and the investigation of an appropriate research methodology must be broad enough to hold a debate with both of these domains.

A project

manager

nppeciatcs

Ematianicg

Fi,igtrre 9: A fianietvork I>o.sedon Habermas' [/weeworlds. Adopted frorn

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 3 Indccd, these are not the only two domains to be considered, and the "richness" of a projcct manager's real-world situation can be sccn reflected in a diagram (figure 9) adapted from John Mingers' (Mingew, 1997, p. 10.) adaptation of the vicws of the postmodem philosopher, Jiirgcn Habermas. After a brief review of the philosophical issues. the debate will proceed to tackle such fundamental questions such as, "What is going on when people gain 'knowledge'?" and "How can we bc sure that what we discover about project managcmcnt is reliable knowledge?", "What rcscarch procedures are appropriate to project management research?", "What role does the global "community of practice" play in discovering. sharing and creating knowledge?" and "How can these considerations be reflected in a practical research method that will lead to improved projcct management practice?"

3.2.1

Preliminary considerations of philosophy

Philosophy predates Christianity by a half millennium or so, and for almost as long as philosophy has been practised, there has been a dcbatc about the primacy of reason or the primacy of observed reality. Certainly, Aristotle's critique of Plato's idealism in the fourth century BC has a familiar ring in the postmodem arcna. This isn't the time or placc to bccome embroiled in a detailed analysis of the histo~yof philosophy, but the pendulum has swung back and forth from one extreme to the other so often that Hegel's "dialectic" has been accepted by many more people in the West than Marx's application of it as "dialcctical materialism". In the modern academy, the debate about where on its trajectory the pendulum rightly belongs is still experienced in the "paradigm wars" wagcd bctwccn those who are still heavily influenced by the enlightenment project and those who embrace the relativism of postmodcmism.

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 3

Sirice the beginning ofthe twentieth cenhiry tire eriormotis sticcess of natrrral science led to its metkods (generali~~ denoted as positivisrrr: a helicfin universal laws, empirical ierificatic~rithrorcgh irrdtrction, nrid observer- and valtie+eedom) being seen as the most reliable iva,vo f generating knowledge, notjtrst in the natural sciences bzrt in the social sciences as upell.However, chinks in positivism4 arntour M!ere apparent within plr.vsics itsev; with the unaiaidahle appearance o f tire ohseriler in Heisenberg's "trncer~tain~~ principle': The Andy bloitrr M'ere provided bj! plzilosoplrers such as Harrson (1958). Ktrlin (1970), and Popper (1 972) who, in variocts wa,ys, denro~strated.fata6~fla~~~r iir the cornerstones o f indrrction, and theory- and uhsen,er-inrir~,rrirlerrt ohsen~atiori.Although this did not haia a signi$cant efl2ct on rite practice o f natural science, it did on social science ii!ltereit legitimated the rise o f various schools ofinterpretir~i.smsuch as phenorrrenolog: ethnonrethodologj; and hermeneutics. During the 1970s nrid ear42 1980s sintilar situations emerxed in organirationul studies, and in ORLrjstenls with the dei~elopmentqfsofi OR and soji ssvstems methodologv (SSM). Each disciphne came to be characterized h ~a ,small set ofcornpetiirg and srrpposed/j~incommerisurahle paradrgtrrr based around rplits hetu~renhard, sop and critical approaches. Practical u~orku9itliinthe discipliner, whether it he social research or organisationnl rritenvention, uIa.7 expected to orcvr within a ~irrgleparadigm, and individual researchers had to aNv thernreli~evwith one parndigm or another . . . However, thts artificial slttlntion corrld not endure nr researchers and practitioners fottnd that no one paradigill cortld capture the rirhners ofreal-utorld ~ituations.(Mingers, 1997, p. -1.)

The realm of management science has, in rccent years, begun to grapple with methods that reflect paradigms broad enough to embrace all three of Habermas' worlds. This Chapter will seek to show that different research methods are appropriate to different philosophical positions and to different epistemic procedures, as shown in Figure 10.

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 3 Philosophical stance

Positivist

Critical Realist

Research method

Figure 10: Rr,~earch~zelhodsand underlying paradigms.

The justification for this position will be argued in the next three sections ofthis Chapter.

3.2.2

What is going on when people gain "knowledge"?

In popular language today, a sharp distinction is drawn between "subjective" opinions and "objective" knowledge. Phrases such as "just give me the facts" give voice to the prevalent idea that somehow "objective" knowledge is of a higher value than the merc "subjective". Ever since the Copernican revolution, science has been seeking to remove "subjectivity" from knowledge, and thus to remove any distortions from man's understanding of the true nature of physical reality. In the realm of philosophy, the logical positivists such as Russell and Ayer have taken this worship of "objectivity" to such an extent that the positivist school admits as real only such statements as can be demonstrated beyond all doubt. As Russell explains, "The pioneers of modem science proceeded from the observation of particular facts to the establishment of exact quantitative laws, by means of which future facts could be predicted." (Russell, 1937, p.58.) As Drusilla Scott illustrates this. "You see from from your office window many un~brellas in the street below (Fact). You suppose it is raining (induction to hypothesis). If so, thc street will be wet and shiny (deduction). You stand up and look (test). It is. Your hypothesis is confirmed." (Scott, 1985, p.30.) An alternative approach has been adopted by Sir Karl Popper, who, recognising that there was something niore to the process of scientific discovery than the cold logic espoused by Russell, chose rather to

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 3 relegate the subjective and creative elements of the process to the realm of psychology. "The war-k oftlte scientist consist.^ in ptrttirrg.f'o~wzrdand testing tlieories. The initial sfage, the act qf'conceiving or inianting a theory, seems to me neither to cal1,for logical arta!~sixnor to he strrrrl~til~le of it. The question how it happens that a new idea occur:^ to a nmn n91zetl?erit is a tnusical theme or. a drantntic conflict or o scieizt@c tlteot:~. - ma,v he q f great interest to the entpiricalps~~chologi.rt btrt it is irrelei~antto the logical annljisis o f scient[f;chroit~ledge. T1ri.s latter is concerrred wit11questions q f ~~alidicv . . . Con a statervent hejt~st[fied? . . . h order tl~ata statement may he logical!i~e.vamined in this it*aj2, it nlrlsst already h o w l ~ e presented e~ to tts. '* (Popper, 1993, p.3 1.) In other words, logical positivism denies the reality of anything tliat cannot be subjected to a standard of proof accomplished only in Mathematics, while those who accept Popper's thcory of science restrict the realm of what can be known by excluding all the messy areas that involve "sttbjective" elements. In sharp contrast to the confidence of science and positivism, the second half of the twentieth century has seen the pendulum swinging back towards a view that is in total contrast to it - a vicw that is often characterised as constructivism, but that leads to the outlook known as "postmodern". In this view, all confidence in man's ability to know anything about reality is replaced by a deep-seated suspicion tliat anything that is spoken says more about the speaker than it says about the object which is spoken about. For cxamplc. "Rolatid Barthcs (I91 5 - 1980) exposes the manipulative power-interests which often underlie the 'mythologies' of the second half of the twentieth century. In his Mj~fltologies(French, 1957; English, 1972) he unmasks what we too often perceive as 'natural' or 'given' as socially contrivcd. Many manipulative devices appear to be natural 'trutths'." (Thiselton, 1995, p. 14.) This view has much to contribute to this research, but both the recursive nature of Barthes' warnine about the hiddcn motives behind ''truth-claims" and also the roots of project management in engineering and technology (both derivative from the natural sciences) each in their own way suggest that constructivism on its own cannot provide the entire context for project management research.

-

-

~

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 3

A radical alternative both to positivism and to constructivism is proposed by Michael Polanyi, a physical chemist and philosopher who gave much thought to a comprehensive theory of knowledge that would explain the "how" bchind the philosophy of thinkers such as Popper and Kuhn. Polanyi saw great danger in the separation of personal judgement and involvement from scientific method, and he assertcd that the devaluing of personal judgement is a self-fulfilling principle, since any faculty that is unused tends to decay. As he saw it, many people have lcss opportunity for using their personal judgement than was true in the past, and when people are consistently told that their personal judgement is unreliable and irrelevant, they use it even less, so that it does indeed become unreliable and irrclcvant. Instead of judging for ourselves, we wait for 'science' to pronounce. As Polanyi put it,

"Backed by a science whrch sternly professes that ultimately all things in the ~vorld-including all the achievements of manfi-om the Homeric poems to the Critique of Pure Reason - will somehow be explained in t e r m of p1z.v.sic.s and chemistry, these theories assume that the path to realiy lies invariabl~~ in representing higher things in terms of their baser partiatlars. This is irzdeed alrnost zlnivemally regarded today as the strpremely critical method, which resists theJattering illusions cherished by men in their nobler facrilties. " (Polanyi, 1959, p. 74.) From the point of vicw of the general public (including, presumably, many project management practitioners), therefore, the prevailing research paradigm is positivist/realist. But this fails to takc account of the actual act of faith that creates the initial worldview that "science" proceeds to investigate. In Popper's words; "From a psychologicalpoint of view I am inclined to think that scienttfic discovery is impossible without faith in ideas which are of a pztrelv speculative kind and sonzetimes quite hazy; a fiith which is qtltte unwarranted.+om the scientiJic point of view. ' T o p p e r , 1993, p. 38.) If a research method is to be developed for the investigation of project management, therefore, it is legitimate to reject both the extremes of positivism and of constructivism, and to search for a route that lies somewhere in bctween. What is required i s a route that recognises the role of both subjective commitment and of tacit knowledge, while

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 3 acknowledging that there is an external reality that can legitimately be investigated. An appropriate place to begin the search for such a route is with a review of the relevant epistemological questions.

3.2.3

Epistemic Considerations

Following Popper, it is reasonable to leave out of consideration how the project management worldview arose. Chapter 1 above gives a brief historical overview, and a fuller account can be found in Moms (1994). But regardless of how the worldview came to be formed, the research task consists of seeking to enumerate the propositions that underpin the worldview, and to examine their validity. The hypothesis that has guided this research programme can be restated in the form of the following six propositions. which together set out the epistemological challenge to be faced. 1.

2. 3.

4.

5.

6.

Project management is a coherent worldview about the way people work together to accomplish complex tasks. As such, it embraces a whole set of propositions that people who adopt it are willing to entertain. Project management attracts adherents and practitioners who niake assertions from within the worldview to people who may or may not embrace the worldview as a whole. To create, develop and promote a conceptual basis to this worldview, academic research must be built on solid epistemological foundations. Assunlptions can only be questioned by accepting others unquestioningly ("a door turns on fixed hinges") To examine the whole world view, it will be necessmy to use different parts of the basis as "hinges" for different pieces of research, that nevertheless cohere with each other.

Much of the focus of research into project management could be characterised as an attempt to discover the principles of project management, and much of the project management literature consists of embodying these so-called principles into established practices. Yet behind this clement of the worldview is a construct that itself needs to be explored - the assertion that there are some principles available to us to be discovered. But are there? The activity of setting out to discover something assumes that the "something" has an objective existence of

Towards improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 3 its own, and is lurking in some sort of "undiscovered state waiting for the explorer to come across it. This is a very "realist" or "positivist" thing to do. A good example might be a fundamcntal law of science, such as the second law of thermodynamics which states that "all energy transfor~nationsare associated with an increase in entropy energy that cannot do work". -

Laws, like principles, exist in language. They are "social constructs" that obtain their "reality" from the fact that numerous human beings agree to their truth and validity. Clusters of constructs form "paradigms", that in turn influence the way people who adhere to those paradigms view the world. Thomas Kuhn's seminal work (1996) illustrates the effect this has and has had on "science". And yet it seems nonsensical to claim that it was the act of "discovering" the sccond law of thermodynamics that brought the phenomenon of entropy into existence. The "truth" that the law is seeking to describe is a property of the physical universe - as it were "woven into the fabric" of physicality itself. Both the universe and its properties cxistcd before the law was created in language to describe it. The law didn't exist before it was "discovered" the "reality" did. Another way to put this is that science, as a discipline, is based on a "realist" attitude to the physical universe, but scientists acknowledge thc necessary existence of social constructs. Indeed, it is one of the characteristics of the scientific method that all such "laws" are typically held to be true "provisionally", pending the emergence of experimental evidence that causes the conshuct to be modified or, indeed, abandoned. Thus, even within the field of science, the strict "realist" philosophy is mediated into a "critical realist" stance that recognises that our access to and understanding of rcality is both incomplete and provisional. However, other vestiges of the positivistlrealist paradigm show lcss signs of acknowledging the existence of socially constrticted reality. The question of the subject and the objcct remains stubbornly resistant to thc inroads of even discoveries made within the realm of physical science, such as Heisenberg's uncertainty principle. As Lorraine Code puts it so effectively:

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 3

From a poritil~el)~ deril*edconception o f scientiJic knonlledge ornev the ideal objectiviy tlrnt ic.alleged to be achiei~ul>le by any knower ~jl?o clesen~estlie label. Pli.v.rical scierice is reprerented as the site of controlled arid ohjectii~eknowing at it7 bert, its prartitioners ar knowers par excellence. The positivist separation of tlte contextr o f d i s m ~ ~ eaiid,iustijcation ty produces the coriclrision that elen thotigh infi)rmation gathering (discover?.) may sometirries be contorrtinated IJJJ the circ~~ntstantiolpeculiarities ofever~:dnylife. jtatificator?~ procedures can efictively pzrrify tlte,final cognitive product - the knowledge -.from any such taint. . . . Clairns tltat tltere is epi.~ternologicalinsight to be gainedfioni understanding tlie p.ychologv qf knowers, or anoiysing tlieir socio-cirltural locations, invite n'ismi.ma1 eitlier as '~sychologism" or us projects belonging to For epistemologicalpztrists. many of these the socio1ogy of kno~~ledge. ptrrsuits can provide anecdotal infor~tmtio~i, but none contributes to tire real brrsiness of epistemo[ogy." (Code, 1998, p. 126.) In rebellion against this narrow exclusion of all than that in which the subject (observer) extracts externally valid and verifiable information from an object, Rorty and other post moiler11 philosophers have advanced very strong claims. building on the later Wittgenstein, that the search for foundations of knowledge sliotdd look within tlie "communally created and communally available history, tradition and culture" for the only possible basis of truth claims. "Relocating questions about knowledge and truth to positions within the conversations of humankind does seem to break the thrall of objectivist detachment and create a forum for dialogic, co-operative debate of the epistemological issues of everyday, practical lifc." (Code, 1998, p. 131.) There are additional worries in the field of project management, where pro.ject teams (consisting of unique groups of people) are strugling in circumstances that will always contain some unique elements to tackle some unique piece of work. The way a personal subject (say an engineer) knows an impersonal object (say a bridge) is fundamentally different from the way that the same subject knows another person (say her supervisor). And the importance of a project manager's knowledge of other people to the practice of project tnatiagenicnt can be inferred directly from e.g. the section of the PMBOK Guide dealing with Human Resource Managcment.

Towanls Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 3 There is a sul~.stantialbodv of literature about dealing with people in an operational, ongoing context. Some uf the manv topics include: Leading, communicating, negotiatirzg, and others discussed in Section 2.4, K e y General Managenrent Skills. Delegating, nrotivating, coaching, mentoring, and other su6jects related to dealing with individuals. Tearr~bziilding, dealing with conflict, and other subjects related to dealing wit11 groups. Perf'ornrance appraisal, reciwitnzent, retention, labor relations, healtlz and safe@ regulations, and other sttbjects related to adnzinisterirzg the hrrr~ranresottr-cefiinction. Most ofthis material is clirectlv applicable to leading and managing people on projects, and the pruject mcrnager and project manage~nent team should be fanziliar with it. However, they must also be sensitive as to how this knowledge is applied on the project. For example: The temporary nature ofprojects means that the personal and organisational relatiorrship.~will generally be both tenlporary and new. The project management team rnrrst take care to select techniqztes tlmt are appropriate for such transient relationships. The nature and nurnber ofproject stakel~olderswill often change as the project nloves from phase to phase of its life cycle. As a resttlt, techniques tlrat are efective in one phase may not be eflective in another. Tlre project managenlent team must take care to use teclrniques that are appropriate to the current needs u f the project. (Duncan, 1996, p. 91J So project management, along with fields such as educational theory and practice, psychology, sociology, anthropology, law, some aspects of medicine and philosophy, politics, history and economics depends for its credibility on knowing people. This means, in effect, that whatever epistemology is adopted, knowing people is at least as worthy a contender for an underlying epistemological paradigm as a knowledge of everyday objects. And yet, in the field of positivist/empiricist scientific method, subjects become objects of observation and reliance upon the simple observational paradigms has the consequence of assimilating those

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 3 subjects to physical objects, reducing their subjectivity and spccificity to interchangeable, observable features. Code, once more:

Tlie contention that people are knou~ablema,: sit ttneasily uiflz pryrhoanalytic decenterings of consciou~strlyectii~i/yartd i+~th postmodern critiqttes oj the unified subject o f Enlightennrent hurnanism.' But I tlzink tlzat this 1s a tensiorf tltat has, at once, to be nckitou~ledgedand maintained. In practice people ofiert krtow one other i ~ e lenough l to make good decisionr nhot~twho m n he counteti on and who cannot, who make.^ a good altv and who does riot. Yet preci~elybecause oftlie~t~ctuations and contradictionr of sul~ject~i3~tv, this process is ongoing, commtinirutii~e.znterpretrve. It i~ never ff.red or corirplete. (Code, 1998, p. 140) Taken together with Polanyi's identification of tacit knowledge. these epistemological arguments suggest that postmodernisin offers some attractive common-sense routes to discovering knowledge about project management. But it lcavcs the quality of that knowledge open to two challenges: 1.

Firstly, there is sufficient external reality involved in the actual enterprise of a project (budgets, durations, physical objects) and so on that any episte~nologythat is eventually adopted must allow for validation of certain elements against external criteria.

2.

Secondly, any truth claims advanced by project managcnicnt practitioners are open to dispute by people who do not have direct access to the same "communally created and co~nmunallyavailable history, tradition and culture." A problem regularly encountered when seeking to convince a sceptical senior management team of the need to change the way business is ordered in order to create a climate for improved project performance!

Each of these two challenges needs to be answered, and the next section of this Chapter will suggest answers to each of thcm.

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 3

Commonly available research methods can be divided into two main groups - quantitative methods and qualitative methods. Thiq creates a dilemma for the project management researcher. Firstly, to take a common-sense approach, three propositions can be advanced:-

I.

Projects exist in world of tangible physical objects - products are developed, bridges and roads are built, people work on activities, cash is deposited in banks. All of these characteristics would suggest the adoption of at least a post positivist paradigm, if not a positivist one. One might expect that it would be straightforward to measure activities and outputs and comparc them with the results obtained using straightforward and well-established quantitative methods.

2.

On the other hand, no two projects are directly comparable. Their contexts, products, services and the people working on them are all different. No two documents produced within a project are identical. Multiple stakeholders each have their own definitions of success. Different project managers each have their own style of operating, so that two people following the same process can have very different motivational effccts on their project team members. These and other similar factors would suggest that a constructivist (or some similar relativist) methodology would be more appropriate.

3.

It follows that neither the positivist or post positivist paradigm on the one hand, nor the constructivist paradigm on the other are sufficiently comprehensive or rigorous to provide the quality of answer that is consistent w ~ t hthe size of the problem.

Further questions were raised in the discussion about epistemology in the previous section, which cannot simply be answered simply by adopting either a quantitative or a qualitative paradigm. In effect, if research into project management is to bc convincing, a new method is required. John Rawls (1971) makes a usehl review of different types of procedures that is extended by Catherine Elgin (1996) into a classification of types of epistemological procedure.

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 3 A perfect ~rocedtirerecognises an independent criterion. for a correct outrome and a niethod ~vhoseresiilts - i f any - are g~mranfeedto satisfy that criterion. Our independent criterion for the, fair divi~ionqf a cake, let zts assume, is that a fair division is an eqtml one. A cake slicing procedure is perfect, then, .just in care it yield.$ an equal division ken it yie1d.s ans division. A.finely calibrated electronic cake slicer that partitioned each cake it divided into eqtrcrlly large slices ~ ~ o u l d provide n perfect procedrcre for f a i r dii*idingcakes. The device worrld not have to he capable qfdividirig ei.ey rake. It nright.for example, be inoperative or1 geometrical^^^ irregular cakes. But so long as every cake it divides i . divided ~ into equal sized slices, its trse u.otrld he a per,fect procedtire.for,fi~irlydividing cakes. An iniperfect procedure recogniser an independent criteriotr.for a correct o~rtcome hut has no way to guarantee that the criterion is sati.$ed Tlie criterion for a correct outcome in a crir~iirtaltrial is that the defendant is convicted if and onlv if he is guilty. Trial Ipp,jury, representation 1q~ counsel, the rule.7 qf evidence and so on, are the means used to secure that restilt. The means are not perfect. Sornetimes a wtrong iierdict i . ~ reached. A pure procedure has no independent standard.for a correct outcome. The procedure itself; when properto performed, deternrines what result is correct. And unless the procedure is arhlallv perfornted. there is no fact qf the matter as to which otltcome is correct. A totirnament is best construed as a pure procedure. . . . Winning the tournament is wltat makes a particular contpetitor the champion. (Elgin, 1996: 26-27.) For a position that lies at neither end of the positivist/conshuctivist spectrum, an imperfect procedure appears to hold the greatest promise. In effect, many scientitic procedures, such as argument from induction, are actually imperfect procedures in Elgin's sense. Truth is its objective, and ampliative inference its means. A large and varied body of evidence is marshalled, statistical techniques are utilised and so on. But the gap between premise and conclosion is not thereby bridged. Tlie conclusion of a sound inductive argument may turn out to bc false. This can lead to a position of despairing scepticisn~. If the conclusioiis drawn from imperfect procedures cannot be trusted in all cases, then we can be sure of nothing. But this is not the only appropriate stance. An alternative, argued for most convincingly by Elgin, is that of an imperfect procedural stance in which each and every proposition, even

Towards lrnproved Project Management Pracfice: Chapter 3

when it appears unimpeachable, is afforded the same provisional credibility, realizing that further findings may yet discredit it. Reasons emerge from a self-nlonitoring, self-critical, self-correcting activi[v. Rather than deriving from a static system of uncompromising rules and rigid restrictiortr, they belong to and are vindicated by a fair& loose and.flaible network of epistemic commitments, all accepted for the nonce as the best we can do, each subject to revision or revoccrtion should defects enierge or improvements he found. . . Being our best guesses as to how things stand, our considered jzrdgenzents are initia1l.v credible. Should they prove inadequate, we round them out with hypotheses and hunches that we have less faith in. Clearly the method is rirb, for considered jrrdgements cun be the rej>o.ritoryo f ancient error; unsupported hypotheses may he insupportable; hunches, wild. . . . Still,jzr.stifcatiort is not circular, since some elements possess a degree o f inrtial credibility that does not derive,fr.omthe rest. Justification is holistic. Support for a conclusion contes not from a single line o f argrrment, htrtfi-om a host of considerations of varying degrees of strength and relevance. . . The aim ofthe enqtti~yis a broad and deep understanPtg of its subject matter: And a measure of the adequacy of a newJinding is its fit with what we think we alreadj~understand. tf thefinding is at all surprising, the background of accepted belief7 is apt to require modification lo , , make roont.for it; and the finding may require revision to,fit into place. v f (Elgin, 1996: 34-35.) The German philosopher Hans-Georg Gadamer developed a general account of knowledge which is consistent with Polanyi's, which arose from a totally different context, and which embodies precisely such an "imperfect procedure" as is argued for by Elgin above. Gadamer's context was a study of hermeneutics, which is an exploration of the problems of ascertaining meaning in works of translation and interpretation. Nobody interprets a text "in a vacuum", as it were. Every reader already possesses a set of prejudgements arising from their personal historical and cultural background, as well as their unique individual experiencc. The actual interpretation of a text arises from a kind of "backwards and forwards" movement between the

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 3

readcr and the text, whereby the text challenges and modifies the prejudgments, which in turn illuminate the text itself. This movement has been called "the hermeneutic circle." The epistemic problem reframes and supplements the first challenge that was raised in the previous section; "how can a reader cvcr know if her interpretation is correct, given the ubiquitous presence of prior prejudgcmentsl" becomes "how can a project management researcher ever know if his interpretation of research data is correct, given the ubiquitous presence of prior prejudgements on the part of all research participants?" "The Iiern~eneutictask becomes autonraticnlly a questioning of things and is alwalis in Dart determined bv this. Thi.7 places hermeneutic work on a,firnt basis. If a person is tryrng to underatand sonrething, he ~vill not be ahle to retv from the start on his own chance previotrs ideas, nlis~ingas logically and ~fuhbornlyas ponihle the arttral nteanirrg o f the te.rt until the latter becomes so persistently attdible that it hreab through the imagined understanding of it. Rafhei; a person trying h, understand a text is prepared for it to tell him son~atlrinzg.That is ~oli)~ a hermeneutically trained mind nzttst be, h r n the start, sen~itiveto the text :F qirality of newness. But this kind qf vensitiviQ)in1~011.e~ neither. "neutrality " in the matter of the object nor tlre extinction of one 'r self; but the con~ciousassimilation ofone's own fore-meanings and prejzidzces. The rrnportant thing is to be aware oforre :T own bicrs. so that the text may present itself In all its newness and tlrur he ahle to awert its own truth against one S own fore-meaning. " (Gadanrer. 1985,/?.238.)

Gadamer argues that, far from trying to eradicate all prejudice, the hermeneutic task is to make the prejudices visible. "It i r the tyranny ofhrdden prejudices that makes us deaf to what speaks to 117 in tradition . . . The recognitrort that all under.rtano'rng inel*itahlvlnvolves some prejttdic gives the hermenetttic problerrr itr real thrust. . . . And there is one.fitdamentcr1 preittdice o f the Eriliglrtenmenf that defines its errenre. the fiindanierttolprejitdice o f the Enlightennrent is the yrejzrdrce against prellrdrce itrelf; ~t~lriclt derzles tradition it^ po~lel: (Gadnrner; 1998. p. 235.) "

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 3 There is no escape from the role of tradition in forming our prejudices, according to Gadamer. So, given the l~biquitousnessof prejudice, the real question is "What distinguishes legitimate prejudiccs from the countless others which it is the undeniable task of critical reason to overcome?" (Gadamer, 1998, p. 240.) Turning to what he calls the "hunlan sciences" (roughly equivalent to the social sciences), Gadamer shows how any particular worldview arises out of a tradition. But this tradition cannot and should not be contrasted with critical reason. The fact is tlrat in h-adition tltere is always an element offreedom and ofhistory itsel$ Elan the most genuine and purr tradition does not a t existed. It needs to be persist because qf the inertia of ~ v l ~once affrnied, enihraced, cnltillated. It is, essentially, preserxwtion, and it is active in all historical change. But preservation is an act of reason, thorrgh an incorzspictloztr one. For this reason, o n b innovation and p7anning appear to be the restrlt of reason. But this is an illtrsion. Even where life changes violently, as in ages of revohtfion,,far niore o f the old is preserved in the supposed transformation of eve~ythingthan anyone knows, and it cortthirte.~with the new to create a new value. . . . Research in the huntnn sciences cannot regard itseIfas in an absolute antithesis to the way in which we, as historical beings, relate to the past. . . Tl~esigrtificance[of what is being exantined in tlie httnran sciences] e.vists at the begiririing of any such research as well as at the end: in choosing tlte theme to be investigated, awakening the desire to investigate, gaining a new problematic. . . . ln the httman sciences we cannot speak of an object ofresearch in the @ same sense as in tlie natural sciences, wljere research penetrates more 8g and more deeplv into nature. Railter, in the lzttntan sciences. . . the theme and object of research are actttaI[v constifuted b ~the l ntotivation ofthe enqui~y. (Gadonter, 1998: 243-245.) e: . In other words, Gadamer concludes that although there are significant differences between the natural and social sciences, there is no completely successful method by which the horizon of particular prejudgements can be escaped. He further concludes that in the social sciences, the role of tradition should not be underestimated.

Towanls Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 3

This is becoming recognised in the field of management science in general, and systems thinking in particular, through thc application of niultiple methodologies in a single research programme. Instead of the classic shape of research (shown in Figure 1 I), there is a growing recognition that "intervention and research is not a discrete event but a process that has phascs or. rather, different types of activities, that will dominate at different times. Particular metliodologics and techniq~tes are more useful for some functions than others and so a combination of approaches may be necessary to provide a comprehensive outcome." (Mingen, 1997, p. 1I.) This is where it is appropriate to move the discussion away from the general nature of the epistemic problems of knowledge to the particular origins of project management as a discipline. As has been seen, management is a discipline that has been codified as a tradition .proiect . through the combined experience of project management practitioners a group that could bc considered as a global "community of practice".

-

The final element in the foundation for the new research methodology, therefore, which also addresses the second challenge raised in the preceding section, can be found in a consideration of the epistemic rolc played by a "community of practice".

3.3.1

The role of Community in the Acquisition of Knowledge

During the 1990s, a corpus of writing has been developed under the general title of “Communities of Practice". "A community of practice is a group that shares knowledge. learns togcthcr, and creates common practices. Communities of practice share information, insight, experience, and tools about an area of common interest (Wenger, 1998). This could be a professional discipline like reservoir engineering or biology, a skill like machine repair. or a topic like a technology, an industry, or a segment of a production proccss." (McDermott, 1999) Project management is such a topic, and the informal network of project management practitioners constitutes such a "community of practice". As Gadamer made clear above, individuals don't learn on their own.

Towards Improved Pfvject Management Practice: Chapter 3 "We are horn into a world alreadyfill of knowledge, a world that already makes sense to other people: ourparents, neighbors, church mernhers, community, counhy. We learn by participating in these comnirrnities and come to embody the ideas, per.spective, prejudices, langtrage, and practices of that cornnttrnity (Wenger, 1998). The same is true for learning a craft or discipline. When we learn a dikcipline whether at school or on the job, we barn more than facts, ideas and techniqtres. IVe enter a territory already occupied by others and learn & by participating with them in the language of that discipline and seeing the world through its distinctions. . . . This perspective is embedded in the discipline and handed down through generations ofpmc1itioner.s. It is part of the hackgrozmd knowledge and accumulated wisdom of the discipline. Architects from different schools approach problems in characteristically different ways. Each school's approach is embedded in the eveiyday practices of itsfacirlp, shared as they see the logic of each other's thinking. Knowledgeflows through professional contmt~nities,from one generation to the ne.yt. Even though we do most of our thinking alone, in our office or study, we are building on the thinking of others and to contribute to contribute to a discipline, we must put our ideas out into the "public" just stewards,for a moment. " Even when we develop ideas that contradict the inherited wisdom of the prqkssion, our "revolutionary" ideas are meaningful o n b in relation to the community's beliefs. They are still a,form ofparticiption in that discipline (Foucault. 1970; Folccault, 1975). Despite changes in membership and dominant paradigms, the discipline itself continues often with its basic assumptions and approaches relatively intact for generations. (McDermott, 1998)~

1

$

1

This community, thcrefore, is both the "custodian" of the project management worldview, and also the group of people who, by the nature of their employment, are charged with delivering the practical results of employing the "worldview" to deliver economic and social benefits through the effective management of individual projects. The final strand in the development of the new research methodology, therefore, is the creation of an explicit "community of practice" from among those practitioners who, like the world's scientific community, have most to gain by the development of "reliable knowledge" about project management, and most to lose by the perpetuation of traditions

Towards lmpmved Project Management Practice: Chapter 3 that are based in niispcrceptions and nlisunderstandings about what is truly the case.

3.4

A new research

Normally in a research programme a particular problem is identified. and then a given saniple of knowleilge chosen, and the appropriate medium for it decided - what sample, what questionnaire, what interviews are needed? The choice of sample will be dctermincd by thc paradigm being adopted, which in turn will have been shaped by the conscious or sub-conscious hypothesis about where the cause of the problem may lic. Once the data has been collected, it is analyscd, conclusions drawn, and a report writtcn that may or may not be published and if it is, may or may not be rcad andlor actcd upon.

I

Problem

)~ypothesis

j/

)Sample Data ) Analysis

)I jI

)~onclusion

Fi.cure 11: The classic shape of ed in detail in Chupter 2 was of interwt to project managers and project sporlsors in the wide mnge of industries represented irt the conm~tiwityof practice. The eleven tol~irsli.sted in section 2.4.4 and covered I>y the i~ariotn"1~odie.sof k r i o ~ ~ k d "g e have all proved relevnnt to ciiflerent indrrstries, and Itair beert confirmed to he important as new networks hove ,furnred ~ i t l t ntemhers,~onracross the ind~istrialspectr.t(nt. 2) Which aspects of project management (such as practices or processes) are sufficiently important to projcct-based organisations that they are felt to be worthy of measurement acmss industries? The research confirmed that detailed li.vts o f qrtestions >om the CPQ (Al>pendLr P-5) and ,from the DCI (Appendi,~P-6) 11.em genervllv necessary and sufficient to nreastrre prqiect nlarlngernent practice.^ over a period ofyears. Tlie range o f tol~icsis tlte same as that covered in nns~verto questiorz I I)

3) What useful cross-industry "metrics" can be developed to measure the relative performance of these practiccs or proccsscs. and what

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 4 constitutes the "benchmark" for them? The research demonstrated that practices could be "measured" (or, better, "assessed'~ against a pragmatic scale of measures for each qziestion in the CPQ. This provides a "relative" scale agatnst agreed standards (akin to Raw1.s' pure epistemic procedure) that allows conzpanies to locate their project management practices relative to other orgunisntions in /he same indz~stry, or relative to other organisations with a comparable approach to project management. The evolution of these scales has been described above, and examples can be seen in Table 6 in section 5.3. I below. The answers to questions 4 and 5 will be provided below in Chapter 5, since they are answered through the analysis of data provided by members of the networks. Indeed, the focus of Chapter 5 will be to provide illustrative examples of the data analysis that has been made possible through the application of thc methodology to date.

' Webster's dictionary. See Figure 3 in Chapter I above. See above, page 2 The tern1 "Communities of Practice", first coined by Etienne Wenger and Jean Lave (Lave and Wenger, 199 I) provides a very useful shorthand for the kind of social theory of knowledge that will be developed in Chapter 3.

Towards improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 5

Chapter5: 5: What does the data show? lllustrative analyses from two data sets. With so much information created in the course of more than six years applying the continuous action research method, this chaptcr must inevitably be selective in the data that are presented. There is also the requirement to protect commercial confidentiality for the member organisations. The method in action will be illustrated by describing the different ways in which data is used by the networks, and then by examining two different sets of data (one from each of the two databases that are the twin pillars of the networks' data) that were collected using each of the twin data pillars that supports the method from each of the two ends of the spectrum. The Corporate Practice Questionnaire (CPQ) is the instrument used by organisations when they first start to apply the continuous action research method. Members of a project management community assess their organisations' practices against a questionnaire with scoring guidelines provided, and from an analysis of the data, thcy are able to compare their own organisation's pmject management practices with those of other organisations that are using the same instrument. The nietrics produced are "relative", and the descriptions of the practices are "qualitative". Illustrative results are described for a group of twelve U K companies covering all practices at a high level, and those practices associated with integrating project working into the organisation in more detail. Illustrative results for one of the companies are then shown against a wider sample of data from a total of 45 organisations. The Data Collection Instrument (DCI) is nearer to the "positivist" end of the method spectrum, seeking, as it does, to compare the management practices employed on specific projects with the actual rcsults obtained by those projects. Quantitative analysis of 136 projects from 23 organisations operating in a range of industries indicates that it

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 5 is possible to identify specific practices that bear a significant relationship to project performance, as measured by the predictability of project duration, project scope and project cost. In the course of this analysis, answers were obtained to questions 4 and 5 of thc six rcscarch questions first listed in section 1.6. The answers will be discussed in section 5.5

The two datasets described above as the "twin pillars" are large and growing. For instance, the CPQ data contains 54 current cases (each of which represents an organisation), for cach of which there are 284 numerical variables and 278 text variables that contain evidence for the scores in the numerical fields. The DCI contains details on 136 projects, and for each project captures up to 145 primary variables, from which a further 50 are derived. Before providing illustrative data from each of them, brief mention should be made of the rich variety of other insights that have been obtained from the method, using combinations of data from one or both of thcsc data sets as inputs to conversations among the community of practice. The two "vehicles" for these structured conversations have been workshops and working parties. It has also bcen possible to produce research papers on specific topics by combining insights from these structured conversations with analysis of data from the two data sets.

Applying the data in workshops Section 3.4 in Chapter 3 described the contribution made by workshops 5.2.1

to the total research process. Each workshop is held on a specific single topic, choscn by thc mcmbcrs of the particular network at the start of the year's activities, in the light of the most recent analyses of the two main instruments. coupled with their own internal project managcmcnt improvement programmes. Once the topic has been decided, organisations are first of all asked what specific outcomes they would like to see from the workshop, and then when this has been assimilated by the research team, delegates are asked to prepare a specific presentation that addresses the topic under discussion. Dcpcnding upon thc topic, the outcomes, and the state of practices known to exist from answers to the CPQ and the DCI, either a limited

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 5 number of organisations are invited to prepare in-depth presentations based on case studies that are relevant to the topic, or all members of the network are each invited to prepare a brief presentation of their organisation's processes, practices and approach to the topic in question. The research team prepare a presentation that combines the data held in the CPQ in answer to relevant questions (scc appendix P-5 for a full list of these questions) with the data on relevant practices and corresponding project performance from the DCI (see appendix P-6 for a list of the questions on project management practices). Several insights have emerged from these workshops, in addition to the conclusions highlighted later in this chapter, and some of them are listed here. These have in turn influenced subsequent working parties, and the design of subsequent versions of the two data collection instruments. In a workshop on "monitoring and controlling progress", three organisations that scored highly in the relevant section of the CPQ (17 questions in section 10 in appendix P-5) gave well-presented case studies of how project control was exercised. From the ensuing conversation, it was concludcd that organisations were much more consciously aware of the processes for gathering and distributing information about progress moch more than of the actual mechanisms of control. When questioned in detail, the organisations concerned concluded that it was "leA largely to the project manager, imless the variances were so large that a senior level of management decided to intervene". (See section 2.5 above for a more dctailed discussion of how this comes about). In a workshop on "estimating timc, cost and resources" (12 questions in section 8 of the CPQ in appendix P-5). a discussion on the difference between the oficial "approach adopted by an organisation and the actual "deployment" revealed the existence of multiple estimates arrived at for different purposes. There can often be a difference, for example, between the estimate on which a sales person bases their bid to a prospective purchaser, the estimate used as the basis for procuring major elements of the project, the estimate used to senior management for the purpose of securing approval, and the estimate used by the project manager for

Towards ImprovedProject Management Practice: Chapter 5 forward-looking control. were explored.

5.2.2

The implications of these differences

Building on the data in working parties

Section 3.4 of Chapter 3 described the role of working parties in developing insights and knowledge. when it became clear that further work of a sustained nature would be beneficial to an understanding of improved project management practice. An example of a working party's "terms of reference" is shown in appendix P-6, and the outcomes of that working party allowed the data analysed below in section 5.4 to be collected. Two other working parties may be cited as illustrations of how knowledge can be deepened or created. The first topic to be investigated (during 1996) was the process of transferring lessons learned from one project to another. The working party mapped out in detail a process that has four bmad steps, and that represented the most common approach in use by membcrs (scc figure 23). Transferring "lessons learned" from project to project.

Projects

Capture Inputs

F ~ y j Cmrnunicatian

--

-1

. .~

Application

New Projects

--f

-

i

Figure 23: Transferring 'lessons learned'fronz project lo project

The working party also developed an assessment instrument to measure the effectiveness and extent to which the various process steps were carried out. They concluded that whereas the process steps associated with the capture of lessons learned (post project reviews and the like)

Towards lmpmved Project Management Pracfice: Chapter 5 scored over 70%, this deteriorated to 65%, 58% and 25% for the remaining steps. A discussion of the implications of these findings was presented at PMI Symposium in October 1999 (Crawford and Cooke-Davies. 1999). and the ideas have bcen further developed in a Chapter in a forthcoming monograph (Cooke-Davies, 2000b). More recently, a working party on "measuring prqject performance" took forward an understanding of different metrics that are appropriate for the measurement of project performance. both during the life cycle of a project, and after its complction. It concluded that the traditional three measures of time, cost and quality present an incomplete picture. that can be more comprehensively represented in terms of seven fhctors:Commercial Success Schedule Success Quality Success Safety & Environmental Success Customer Success People Succcss, and Organisational Benefits. The work has subsequently been picked up and taken further by the networks in Australia, from whom results are awaited. There is also the intention to incorporate these findings into future versions of the DCI. as will be discussed in Chapter 6.

5.2.3

Combining insights with fresh analysis.

A recent paper on knowledge management (Cooke-Davies, 2000a) illustrates the third way in which data from multiple sources can be combined. In this paper, the findings of the working party on learning lessons were combined with some data from relevant DCI questions, and a re-combination of questions from within the CPQ, to suggest both the extent to which knowledge management is currently employed, and its overall importance.

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 5 For example, the answers to two questions about finishing a project and starting a project were compared and contrasted (see Figure 24). It is interesting how poorly companies rate the quality of their post-project reviews, compared to their confidence in the project start-up process.

82. Do all projects hold postproject reviews to capture any relevant project information? F i p r e 24: Project smrt-up and Post Project Reviews

Two deductions were ventured from this:. Although three quarters of the 15 companies surveyed in 1996 had some form of post-project review process in place for capturing lessons learned about projects, only 2 conlpanies out of 39 surveyed in 1999 believed that the process was effective. Could it be that companies "go through the motions"? Over half the organisations surveyed in 1999 rate their project start-up process highly, even though the same companies acknowledge that the "lessons learned" process is ineffective. It is as if they are saying to themselves, "We didn't learn from the last one, but we're setting it properly this time." In a further scction of thc paper, 27 of the CPQ questions were found to be pertinent to five topics that conversations in workshops had

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 5 suggested might he related to knowledge nianagement doing duty in more than one category.

-

3 of then1

The topics with the number of relevant questions were as follows:-

*

The nature and extent of pmject management training (5 questions) Specific knowledge management practices (I 0 questions) Questions about information management, metrics etc. ( 5 questions) Questions about the nature and extent of the project management community (6 questions) Question4 about the project n~anagenicntculture (4 questions)

Both deployment and approach for these five topics was very low relative to other topics in the CPQ. Table 5 shows how the mean deployment scores for these five areas compare with the eleven main topics examined by the nctwork. Proiect Manaaement As~ect Projecl Planning Defining and Executing Projects Manag~ngby Projects ldent~fy~ng and Managlng Risk Defin~ngProject "Anatomy" Human Factors Monttoring & Controlling Progress Estimat~ng Infonnatron'

Cullure* Trarning' Managlng Quality Community* Closing Prolects Measuring Project Performance Knowledoe' Tahie 5: Kno~~Ied,ye a n d Cornrnrinrl)~ huctires

Score

60% 60% 58% 58% 57% 56% 56% 54% 53% 52% 51% 50% 49X 47% 46% 4 5%

The paper concluded that there is much room for improvement in these areas in project-based organisations.

5.3

The Corporate Practice Q

Thc Corporate Practice Questionnaire (CPQ) was the first instrument developed for use in this rcscarch programme (See appendix L-2). It's

Towards Improved Pmject Management Practice: Chapter 5

development through three stages has been described in Chapter 4 above, and a complete list of the questions are included at Appendix P5. The purpose of the instrument is to provide organisations with a "ranging shot", allowing them to see how their practices compare with other companies that have provided data. This allows them to make decisions about the topics that they wish to scc included in the continoous action research programme.

5.3.1

How organisations use the CPQ

This section does not contain a detailed and exhaustive analysis of the data because the subjective nature of thc scoring makes the value of the data suspect in terms of deducing generalised conclusions about project management practices that are useful to all companies and in all circumstances. Organisations that have wrestled with providing an answer to each question based on the guidelines provided (see below) find great value in comparing their practices and scores (subjectively arrived at through internal dialogue) with other organisations with whom they have built up a relationship through the workshops, working parties, and informal contacts. Each qucstion in thc CPQ is supplied to the network member with an explanation of the rationale, and some scoring guidelines. For example, the first topic of the CPQ explores the extent to which organisations integrate project working into the whole organisation, and the first section of the questionnaire explores the extent of project working throughout the organisation. The questions, rationale and scoring guidelines for this sub-topic are shown below

01. Intqratingproject workittg into the organisation-

a) Extent of project working Docs the organisation recognise projects as a valid way of working? 1 This question is probing the extent to which a project structure is employed by the organisatinn in executing its business. Snme organisations do not e~nployany fort11of pmjcct working either through igl~oranceor through a preference for a departmental structure while others treat virtually all activities as projects. Pmjects are not the preferred way of working. (0) All mainstream activities are treated as projects. (3) A11 activities are treated as projects (5)

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 5 A score of 0 may he given for an organisation that has projects hot where lhey are set up in the face of strong management opposition or indifference. A s o r e of 5 wmld only he given if all activities in all departments (e.g. Accounts and Sales) are auto~naticallyp~ojectoriented.

4

To what extent are project management practices hrought to hear when implementing change programmes?

All our change programmes are tun as totally separate entities from our project management activities. (0) Some of our project management techniques are used in the managemenl of change. (2) We have a fi~llyintegrated approach to change management using the full power of prniect management where appropriate. (5) It should be noted that this does not imply lhat mainstream pmject management is necessarily involved in managing change prngrammes. 5 How is the Project Oflice concept used to soppolt change in the organisation? A prnject office provides a centralised service for all elements of a project. It usually provides planning, monitoring and control ft~nctionsas well as heing the source of information ahout methodology, standards and hest praclice. No use is made of a project office. (0) There is an informal tracking ofprogress, costs atid the perceived benefits. (3) A formal project office is wt up for all change progranimes to provide accorate recording of the key indicators. (5).

7 Howmany levels of hieranhy are involved in financial, resouning, and scheduling decisions'? Every decision that must be referred upwards inevitably leads to a delay. In any organisstion a balance has to be struck between the delay incarred and the control to he exercised. At least three levels are involved. (0) The project manager has all the authority needed.(S)

Towanls Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 5 12 Are there stn~ctilredill-house learning opportunities for all staff giving them access to basic project In order to filnction effectively all slaffin the organisation need to he aware ofthc basics of project nianagement and the project appmach applied in the organisation. There i s no training availahle. (0) Good training is availahle forproject staff. (2) Good structured and controllcd training is available for all proiect staff and for those directly asstlciatcd with pmjects at the time. (3) All stanare given pmject rna~~age~iient training at an appropriate level as part of their nonnal personal develop~nentplan. (5)

Table 6: Questions on "Extent o f Project N'or-king".

Each organisation then decidcs how it can best obtain the data from the project management practitioners within the organisation, or in the part of the organisation that is being represented in the network. Answcrs are then provided to the research database, for subsequent analysis of both thc words and tlic numbers. The episteniic procedure is much more akin to Rawls' "purc" procedure, where the result of the score contains within itself the rating that members have agreed among themselves is an appropriate result, than it relates to an objective measure of 'khich practices produce the best result". Indeed, this question is hardly touched upon, since no tangible metrics for performance are included in the instrument - the nearest is the thrce questions on how the overall success of projects is judged by the organisation, the customers and the project team members. More will be said about using the CPQ data in sea~chof "objective" (positivist) insights later in this Chapter. In this first section of the results, a set of extracts will be produced from a report produced in May 1999, showing how organisations can position themselves relative to other members of both their own network and other networks, in order to get some indications of how their practices differ from those of other organisations that they respect.

5.3.2

Illustrative results produced from the CPQ

The particular analysis that will be used for this illustration included data from the following companies:-

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 5 The Automobile Association Balfour Beatty BBC Monitoring British Telecom Cable and,Wireless Communications (from two separate drvis~ons) Halifax plc Lloyds TSB Marconi Electronic Systems Matra Marconi Space UK Perkin-Elmer Post Oftice Consultants SmithKline Beecham Comparative results were produced for each topic and sub-topic, for the network as a whole. and for sub-divisions within the network. At an overview Icvcl, the range of scores was shown for all topics, both for "approach" and for "deployn~ent".'

Towards lrnproved Project Management Practice: Chapter 5

~megrat~n

~natomy ~eta~xsc ~lennbw ~isk Hulnan Faclas Mew3 Chsurs EstUmllm) CmVol

Approach Scores

I

Figtire 25: Range of opproach scores.

An additional report was produced for each member of the network, indicating with a star on the boxplots how their own scores compared with those for the network as a whole. This allowed members to locate their scores into the appropriate quartile for each topic.

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 5

Deployment Smres

Figtire 26: Ra~igeof deployment scores.

Comparison was made between organisations that carried out their projects for internal clients using their own resources (known as the "inhouse" perspective) with others that provided products or services to external clients (suppliers) or that bought project services in from supplier companies (procurers) - see Figure 27. The fourth powible perspective (an organisation that undertakes projects for external clients using external resources) is that of "prime contractor".

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 5

Figure 27: Range of approach scores b y perspeclive.

Since this report contained data from members who had produccd answers to the previous version of the CPQ report, it was also possible to show how scores had moved for the same companies, including only those questions that had been common to both versions of the CPQ. (See Figure 28).

Towards improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 5

I

I

Figlire 28: Cowlparison of CPQ deplo).menrscores over time.

From these and similar charts, taken together with an analysis of the textual evidence, it was possible to draw some conclusions that applied to this selection of members, as follows:Project management commtmities believed that tlreir organisations were generally dissatisfied witlz the results obtained by their projects. due to over-optimism at the outset, late completion, overspendr. ,failtrrr to deliver benefits and lower-than-expected return on pro$t. Mztch excellent project management practice was incorporated into tire approach of these same organisations, and in certain critical areas. such as risk management, it was improving. Projectplarzning and risk ntanagenient scored Iziglilj~for both approach and der~loynierit,and virtu all^ all companies in the data set were adopting ways of integrating project working into the organisation and developing "mu~clemetnor-v " through the use of standard corporate approaches or a corporate metlzodology.

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 5 Any deli~,erysystem, however; is only as good as its weakestpoirzt, and the report pointed to such weak points in general practice uithin the neiw~ork.DeplojJmentwas generally less good than approach in ail areas, brrtpartinrlarly so anzortg the top-scoring conzpanies for "nzonitoring and controlling progress " and,for "closing projects ". Among the ninjority of conil7cmies, "risk identification and management" revealed the largest gap between approach unci dep10)~ment. A thenze that threaded its way through the individual topics was tlie challenge,faced b ~even j the best organisations in transferring lessons learned from one project to another. This was the worst scoring suhtopic in tlie report. The challenge showed up most acutely in "closing projects", a topic that was not only the lowest scoririg one in the questionnairv. but was one that had become noticeably worse in the two years or so since the questionnaire had last been answered by the network. The second-lowest scoring topic wa.v project control. Costs were controlled better than schedule, with resources being controiled elen less well. When the lack of conhol was considered together with the difficulties in learning lessons, tlie weakest point in the delivery systents hegan to reveal itselj In-house project organisations who lacked both the disciplines o f contr.act,~(which proctrrers had) and the incentive of commercial sttrvii,al (u.,Iiic/isrrppliers have) scored less well than the orhers in foitr areas: "closing projects ", 'jx-oject planning ","monitoring and controlling progress" and "managing quality". (Extract from CPQ Report. 1999)

A more detailed comparison of both the scores for sub-topics, and the text answers that were provided as evidence for their scores by membcrs, allowed ccrtain patterns to be identified for the specific group of companies providing the data. The following example shows both the scores (Figure 29) and the comments2 that were offered in connection with the answers to Topic 1 , Integrating Project Working into the organisation.

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 5

Key

mWhdeTmc rn~d@"I 0l"lmfkT

=-err n=

84

I4

4

A~pmech

91

11

1&

I4

iwmvement

I4

Oeokwtnn

Type of Answer

Figure 29: CPQ Score.7 for Topic I : htegrnfion

AuproacB

Exlent of Project Working In higher scoring companies project management training and srippor.t is nvailal~leto all emploj~ees,and aN manogem undergo project management awareness training. All activities are regarded as projects, bicluding all change marlagenrent activities. Sortre orgorrisation.~with extensive project ~vorking,however, do not manage organisational change usingproject nranagement techniques. Higher scoring companies give project manager.~,fitllauthorif?tonce a project has been authorised.

Best practice is to regardprojects a7 an es~eirtialpartofthe btrsiness wrfh project nlnnagers having no otlrer joh finctions. There is a lirik hetween atrthoriqed project budgets and schetttrles and crssrrrnptioris ofprojects integrated into the brissiness plarr. T/~e$na~icialprogrorns

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 5 are integrated into long range capitalplannrng cycles, and are not altered to suit annurrl budgeting. Program management is widely used, but portfilio nianagement polarises membert of the nehtark between tliose ~ . v h ~portfolio re reviewr are an mtegral part o f business operatzons, and those u)hereeach project runs purely as a stand-alone entit): Higher scorzng companie~have (I mechanism for integratrng project e.vtimates ?vith /Ire corporate budgets. ERPs stich as SAP are beginning to appear hplen~entingProcess Improventent Scores are generally worre than in the previous isszre o f the Corporate Practrce Report (I996 - 1997). There is a broad spect~unzofpractices w,itli I~etterorganisations kavirrg btrdgets available to support process impmtament and eflicient process tnrpro~mientprocesses linked to IS0 registration. Tlze tire of a rtandard corporate methodolog),is still the most widely lrsed niechanisnl to spread the application ojhest practice.

114 %g

# d3

#

8

Best pycfice companies implement training tIiroughout the project orgartrsatron and regard project management as a means q f introdttcing change. Deployment ofien.falls down, however; wlien only the project ntanagers are seen to he tltose requiring training and it is their responsibility to add the project managenlent discipline to their projects. One or two companies run change progranrmes con~pletely independently of tlie project managenzent community, and make no efort to employ the expertise ofprqfe.miona1 project managers. Higher scoring companies have regular reviews of all projects und,feed data into the project office, whereas other companies use project ofices only lvhen a ctistomer willpay,for them, or ifthe project is large enoz~glr.Project managers in a few companies are granted explicit tolerances and all necessagl autlzoriiy to make decisions, whereas in many organisations key decisions are completely outside the control of the project team

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 5

Irrtegration of projects A broad spread ofpracticer rangesfiom "ad hoccery " to a sh'rict~rred u~~proach that integrates projects Into stmtegs via program managerr or project portfolios. Poor forecasting on pr-oject~can result irr the btr~inessplanning process ignoring pioject planr, pnrticttlnrlv poor resources. Alignment appears to be sirt~plerfor supplier r, who ye entire business consists o f delii~eringcurtorner project. There i r a wide divergence in the practice o f applying portfolio nranagernent. reveral organ is at ion^ comment on the recent introrhrction ofprogram management and its partial implementatiorr. Implementing Process Improvement The most contnton[ip cited reavonsfor deployment falling short of approach are a lack offunding and a lack ofs~rpportfiornthe top o f the organiration. IVhere best practice ir rpread, it ir 11mra1tytlrrr,uglt the medium o f knowledgeable individuals transferring fin1 one projecl to another

5.3.3

Individual company indications.

Reference has been made above to the ability of individual members of the nctwork to compare their performance with that of others. and some examples will be included to illustrate this. The examples are all created using an Excel spreadsheet with macros" that enable a member company to examine the detailed numerical variations between their own score and those of their own or selected other networks on any topic, sub-topic or individual question The first ability is to compare practices for the whole CPQ "at a glance" (Figure 30). These Kiviet diagrams show the high, low. median. 25th and 75th percentile scores, along with the actual scorcs for an individual company.

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 5

&pra=b

nu . r r r
120%.. These can be considered as three independent measures (1, 2 and 4), with five further measures derived from these primary ratios. Firstly, a word about the fact that not all the projects ia the data set had been completed at the time of submitting data. This might cause some concern if it could be shown that variances from plan increased, the further the project advanced through the life cycle. In the event, this isn't the case. There is no significant correlation between the "MAKPE" of a project, and the measures of predictability (see Table 7). It is thus possible to draw conclusions from the set of data as a whole. . . .....

I

Con w i n a b i l i t v l Time Predidabililyl Smps ~redidabil'nyl W P E 0233916 OW522 1 0.296023 0 W0597 0.960613 0 056758

COS PTediaabili?y

Peemn Correlmion Sio 12-lsrladl

Time Predinabilily

Pesmn Correlation

0 295023 0 M0597

Smps Predidabildy

Pesmn Correlation Sig. (2.tailed)

0 233916 0 056758

MAKPE

Pearsln Correlation Sig. (2-tailed) N

0960413

123

4 025760 08 3 ~ 1 0.021112 0 815226 125

4.1123SU 0.398717

d.HZ390 0396717 59

128

Table 7: Correlatiotts behveen predictors mid "MAKPE".

There is a significant correlation between time predictability and cost predictability (P=0.0005), but there are big differences for individual projects, as can be seen in figure 40.

Towanls lmproved Pwect Management Practice: Chapter 5

Time predictability (Log scale)

Figure 40: Relntionship behieen tinte and cost predictability.

Rather more of the variation in cost from plan is accounted for by variations in scope: the root mean square is 0.1566 (Figure 41), even though the significance of the correlation is somewhat lower at 0.0010.

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 5 I

I

Cost Predictability

Figure 41: Relationshij~hetween cost and scopepredictabilily.

Note that the scatter plot in figure 41 contains only 66 data points, rather than the 67 that are contained in the data set. The case that has been omitted (Project 32) was an extreme outlier for scope predictability, owing to unique circurnstanccs known to the researcher. In this particular project the supplier agreed to provide a product that exceeded the specified scope by virtually 100%. without passing on the costs to the procurer (who provided the data), in order to provide themselves with experience of using a new technology. Admittedly, all projects are unique, but in this case, the costs reflected in the project data (as paid by the procurer) provided no reflection of the work carried out (intentionally) by the supplier. It is thus legitimatc to exclude the data point - indeed, to leavc it in would distort the data more than to exclude it. There is no significant relationship between scope predictability and time predictability (P=0.935). Since cost control is a visible and pervasive aspect of organisational life, and projects play their part (as has been seen), the suggestion is that controlling time on projects can

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 5 have a small impact on costs, and controlling scope can have a somewhat larger one. Before examining the impact of specific project management practices, the relationship was investigated between project performance and the industry, type of project, and scalc of project (cost and duration). Investigations revealed no significant correlation between any of the performance measures and industry or type of project, other than a higher median scope predictability for "suppliers" (P=0.0013), which sounds reasonable, but is unreliable because only two projects from suppliers contained scope predictability data. Carelallms Duration (wee&)

P e m Conelalim Sig (2-116)

N

Cod P d I a a b i l L 0 1713 00513 130

Time PRdiaabilitV

S-

02MO 0 0077

19

Predidabilily 0 2868 0 01%

66

Table 8: Correlations between predictors and project dzir~~tion.

Examination of the scale of the project, however, reveals more significant correlations. Both time predictability (P=0.0022) and, to a lesser extent, scope predictability (P=0.0196) show a correlation to the duration of the project (see table 8). suggesting that the longer the project, the more difficult it is to control both schedule and scope. I suppose that the project managers of the new British Library project would be willing to attest to the validity of this finding!!

5.4.3

Strategic decisions

An assumption that can be tested as a part of this overall research question is the extent to which project management practices are determined by the strategies adopted towards the project and the procurenlent contracts. The chosen project strategy should, theoretically, drive the management practices followcd on a specific project. To investigate whether this appears to be the case in practice, participants were requested to identify which of the following drivers governed the prqject strategy that was adopted:-

Towards Improved Pqect Management Practice: Chapter 5 Time Cost Quality Relationships Process Contingency (i.e. the strategy was dictated by specific circumstances not covered by any of the previous five).

-

As an additional question, the strategy was identified as one of..The kind of strategy that is usually adopted. The kind of strategy with which the organisation is familiar, but which is not the usual strategy, or A strategy that is novel to the organisation.

In addition, the strategy pursued when placing contracts to procure major elements of the project was identified as being:-

*

Fixcd price Target price Flexible price (i.e. time and materials, or some variant of it) A hybrid strategy (combining elements of the first three) A partnering strategy (based on partnering arrangements with suppliers, that specify overall terms and conditions for these and other projects) An alliance strategy (based on pain- and gain-sharing arrangements that treat suppliers as equity-holding partncrs in the project).

Towards lmpmved Project Management Practice: Chapter 5

cost

Basis of Strategy

Figtire 42: n p e s ofproject strategy.

Figure 42 shows the number of projects adopting each type of project strategy. The most common driver of project strategy is time, followed closely by cost. These two account for the strategies of nearly two thirds of all the projects answering these questions. Only 10.1% of all strategies are ones that have not been used before, with 59.6% being the "usual" strategy - suggesting a conservatism about the choice of project strategy. A similar conservatism appears to influence the choice of contract strategy, with 53% of all projects that answered the question employing a "fixed price" strategy. A further 23% use a "flexible price" contract strategy. There is no evidence that any of these strategies is generally successful in achieving its objectives. There are no statistically significant correlations between any of the three variables for project strategy and any of the seven measures of project performance. It might have been expected that a time-bascd stratcgy would produce better time predictability, or that cost predictability might be influenced by either a

Towards Improved Project Managemenf Practice: Chapter 5 cost-based strategy. or by a fixed price contract strategy. That doesn't appear to be the case. Even familiarity with the strategy appears to offer no reliable path towards any measure of predictability. It would appear that the choice of a strategy based on a high-level desire to control a specific aspect of projcct performance (such as project duration) provides no confidence that it will have the desired effect.

5.4.4

Project management practices.

So far, it has been possiblc to draw thrce gencral conclusions that relate to a wide variety of projects: firstly, that the longer the project lasts, the more difficult it is to control; secondly, that cost control depends to a small extent on time control, but to a greater extent on scope control; and thirdly, that choosing a project or contract strategy at a high-lcvcl of generalization providcs no guarantees of achieving the desired performance. It is now time to examine what might be going on behind these three broad conclusions - to see what project management practiccs, if any, can be shown to influence project performance. The "sofr" data on project management practices was answered by providing answers to 81 questions (Listed at Appendix P-6) in the form of an assessment of the adequacy OF the practice, as carried out, for the complete conduct of the project. Participating organisations validated this data, along with the "hard" data described above, by approving a report listing each of the projects that they had submitted, along with the data contained on it in tltc database. Where organisations were unhappy that the data reflected the situation as they understood it, they amended it as appropriate. Very few amendments were necessary. Project management practiccs employed on the specific project were investigated by means of 82 questions (see Appendix P-5). These were supplenlented by gathering other information about the strategies adopted, and the way the project was organized. The scale used to score these project rnanagcmcnt practiccs was a four-point scale ranging from Not at all adequate ( I ) , through Partially adequate (2), and Largely adequate (3) to Fully adequate (4). Representatives from each organisation were trained on the meaning of these terms, and pilot project data was obtained by the researcher working with individual project managers. Strenuous effort was made to ensure a uniformity of

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 5 onclerstandiiig of the scoring scalc, and of the prccisc meaning of each question. Where the question referred to a "product" (i.e. a physical or logical entity that was produced for the purposes of managing the project), then this was thc only scale used. Where the question referred to a "process", however, an additional scale was used - that of thc "maturity" of the process. Herc the scale needs a little more explanation. A six-point scale was used:Not at All

The process does not exist. (0)

Committed

There is organisational commitment that a process should be used. (1)

Activc

The process is being used on this project at the moment. (2)

Performing The process is bcing used on this project at the moment by those fully trained in its use. (3) Measuring

The appropriate use of the process on this project is being measured, using a formal standard. (4)

Verifying

The appropriate use of the process on this project is being measured, using a formal standard, the measurement is verified using a formal audit process and the process is reviewed. (5)

In addition to scores for individual questions, composite scores were calculated as the average for the following groups of questions:1.

Planning o Time planning o Cost planning o Resource planning o Quality planning

2.

Control o Time control o Cost control o Resource control

Towards lmpmved Project Management Practice: Chapter 5 o o 3.

Quality control Changc control

Human Resources Teamwork o Corporate culture o Competencies o Roles and Responsibilities o Client Managcment o

4.

Requirements management

5.

Risk Management

6. Communications The strategy for analysing those practices that might have a significant influence on some measure of project performance has been two-fold. Firstly, a CHAlD (Chi-squared Automatic Interaction Detector) algorithm was employed to segment the whole data set according to the most significant relationships that can bc used as predictors of each of the performance measures. Secondly, a bivatiate correlation analysis was carried out, comparing each of the variables individually with each of the performance measures. When significant relationships were identified, the relationship between the project management practice and the performance measure that it correlates to was expressed graphically using either a scatter plot or a boxplot, depending on the nature of the variable. CHAlD Analysis Figure 41 shows the CHAlD analysis for practices influencing time predictability. The most significant relationship (P=0.0019) is the answer to question P2, ''Is there company-wide education on risk concepts?". The figure shows that a total of 13 projects gave an answer of "fully adequate" (which equates to a score of 4), and avcraged time predictability of 93.7% (6.3% early against plan) compared to the mean for the whole data set of 12.7% late. At the other end of the spectruni, the 16 projects that scored "not at all adequate" were, on average, 41.2% late. These two populations were too small to subdivide furthcr according to the rules that were used for this analysis (each parent

Towards Improved Project Managernenf Practice: Chapter 5 category should be no less than 20 projects, and each child category no fewer than I0 projects). The exact rules used are a matter of judgement. If the categories are made large (say 100 for a parent, and 50 for a cliild), the model is likcly to be very robust for predictive purposes, but will require a large sample to obtain significant relationships. If. on the other hand, the categories are made too small (say 10 for a parent and I for a child), there is likely to be a highly accurate description of the relationships within the current dataset, but little chance of the results being replicated in the case of a similar number of different projects. The actual rules adopted were 20 and 10 if possible, reducing to 15 and 5 if no significant relationships emerged in the first instance.

I

I

Fiprre 4 3 . CIfAID arta[v.vis. showing practices infltrer~cingtinlepredictlihili!~~.

The central group at the first level in figure 43 contain 79 projects that either scored 2 or 3 (partly or largely adequate) to question P2, or else did not answer the question at all. These had a mean time predictability of 10% late. This group next divided on a relationship alrcady identified - the project duration. The twelve projects lasting longer than 3 ycars averaged 32.4% late. while the 67 projects that lasted less than 3 years averaged 6% late. The significance of this relationship was P=0.0034.

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 5 Finally, the population of 67 shorter projects was further subdivided according to thc answers given to qucstion PI, "Are there check lists of risks appropriate to the project?" The significance of this correlation is lower (P=0.0354), and this time the better time predictability was achieved by those 36 projects that scored 3 or 4 (largely or fully adequate) to achieve a score for time predictability of 100.76%, less than 1% late. Unlike time predictability, for which nine project management practices showed significant correlations, cost predictability correlated to only two, "Have changes to scope been allowed only through scope change control process?" and "Has a system been used to provide the right level of information at the right level of authority?'. In figure 44, the most significant correlation was that involving the maturity of the scope change control process, in which the 81 projects scoring "Performing" or higher (but also including those not providing an answer to this question) averaged 1.4% cost escalation, compared to the average of all projects of 3.0%. Those 21 projects within this population that answered "fully adequate" to question 17 about providing the right level of information at the right level of authority improved this further to an average of 4.5% better than budget.

Figure 44: Practices correlatirtg to cost prediclability

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 5 C h a i d analysis against the other performance variables failed t o identify any relationships w i t h a significance o f greater than 0.01.

Bivariate Correlations A second search f o r significant correlations between project managerncnt practices and project results was conducted using bivariate correlations. T h e Person correlation cocfficicnt was identified f o r each variable compared t o each measure o f project performance, and the significance o f the relationship established using a paired T-Test. T h e results identified a total o f 21 correlations (see also Appendix.L-3) N Correlation Pair 1 Time Predictability & P2N 100 -0.3136 Pair 2 Cost and Time Predictability & P2N 98 -0.3462 Pair 3 Time Predictability & Q2M I00 -0.3279 Pair 4 Cost and Time Predictability & Q2M 98 -0.2825 Pair 5 Time Predictability & 9 5 100 -0.3128 Pair 6 Time Predictability & Q6 100 -0.3524 Pair 7 Cost and Time Predictability & Q6 98 -0.3026 Pair 8 Time Predictability & Q7 100 -0.3626 Pair 9 Cost and Time Predictability & Q7 98 -0.2976 Pair 10 Time Predictability & Q12M I00 -0.2684 Pair 11 Q16M & Scope Predictability 34 -0.5815 Pair 12 Time Predictability & Q31M 100 -0.2807 Pair 13 Cost and Time Predictability & Q31M 98 -0.2551 Pair 14 Q65 & Scope Predictability 34 -0.4849 Pair 15 Time Predictability & Q66 100 -0.3074 Pair 16 Time Predictability & Q2C 100 -0.2875 Pair 17 Time Predictability & Q3C 100 -0.2731 Pair 18 Q16C & Scope Predictability 34 -0.5120 Pair 19 Cost Predictability & Q28C 98 -0.2735 Pair 20 Cost Predictability & Q29C 98 -0.2609 Pair 21 Overall Predictability (1) & Q47C 34 -0.4635 lable 9: Signijicanl corrrluliuns belii~eenpractices andl~erjormonce.

Sig. 0.0015 0.0005 0.0009 0.0048 0.0015 0.0003 0.0025 0.0002 0.0029 0.0069 0.0003 0.0047 0.0112 0.0037 0.0019 0.0037 0.0060 0.0020 0.0064 0.0095 0.0058

T h i s suggests that w i t h i n this set o f data, there are some specific project management practices that influcnce time predictability (P2N, 2M, 2C, 3C, 5,6,7,12M, 3 1 M and 66). The suffix M (or N in the case o f the 5 "P" - f o r pre-project - questions) denotes the "adequacy" answer, where the suffix C denotes the maturity score. I n the case o f questions about "products", there i s n o suffix, sincc o n l y thc "adequacy" was recorded. These questions that influence correlate significantly t o tiiiie predictability are:P2

I s there company-widc cducation o n risk concepts? (Adcquacy)

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 5 2

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Is there a formal process for identifying and quantifying risks? (Adequacy and maturity) Is there a process for selecting kcy risks based on probability and impact? (Maturity) Have all risks that are to be managed had owners assigned? Is there a visible risk register showing the impact & probability of each risk, and other information? Is the risk management plan up to date? Is information about risks communicated to the project team throughout the life of the project? (Adequacy) Have baselines been well maintained and effective change management processes operated? (Adequacy) Is thcrc a docunicnt that shows which organisational unit is responsible for which work items?

The nature of these relationships can be illustraled graphically, as is shown in Figure 45, by the normal boxplot comparison of answers to tlic spccific question (in this case P2) with the range of values for time predictability. The significance is 0.001. On this, and the boxplots in figures 22 and 23, a hollow circle represents an "outlier" (a distancc of more than I % box widths outside the box) while an asterisk represents an "cxtrcme"( a distance of more than 3 box widths outside the box).

Towards Improved Pmject Management Pracfice: Chapter 5

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Question P2: Company-widerisk education

Figrtre 45: Influence of conipony-wide risk educntiorr on lime j~redictnbilitj.

The corresponding questions that correlate to cost predictability are 28C and 29C Have changes to scope been allowed only through scope change control process? (Maturity) Q29 Has the integrity of the performance measurement baseline been maintained? (Maturity)

Q28

There are two dificulties with the practices correlating to scope predictability. Firstly, the number of data points (34) is small relative to the variations in scope recorded; and secondly, the Chaid analysis produced no relationships at 99% confidence (i.e. P of 0.01 or lower). For these reasons. no conclusions are drawn about practices that correlate to scope predictability. Further investigation of t h e correlations The significant correlations that have been identified above provide a good description of project managenlent practices that were shown to have a significant effect on the projects in the data set. But how

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 5 generally can these conclusions be applied? Will it always be true to say that having good company-wide education on risk management will increase an organisation's ability to predict the duration of varied kinds of projects?

To answer these questions, further investigation was required into the nature of the correlations within the dataset. This was carried out in two stages. Firstly, taking each of the variables that had been identified as significant using Pearson's Coefficient, a one-way analysis of variance was canied out, and significance tested once more. The results are shown in Appendix P-8, and confirm that for the following practices, the significance is still below 0.01, giving a confidence level of greater than 99%.

P2 6 7

Is there company-wide education on risk conccpts? (Adequacy) Is there a visible risk register showing the impact & probability of cach risk, and other information? Is the risk management plan up to date?

COST Q28

Have changes to scope been allowed only through scope change control process? (Maturity)

The significance of the project duration in dctcrmining time variance was also confirmed at a confidence level of more than 99.8% (P=0.0016) This correlation was illustrated graphically, by producing error bars of the range of values for the mean of the dcpcndent variable (time- or cost-predictability) that could be expected with a 95% confidence level for each value of the answer given to the question. Such a chart is shown as Figure 46.

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 5

For the following practices, the significance was above 0.01, but below 0.05, giving a confidence level of greater than 95%. TIME 2 5

12 31 66

1s there a formal process for identifying and quantifying risks? (Adequacy and maturity) Have all risks that are to be managed had owners assigned'? Is information about risks coniniunicated to the project team throughout the life of the project? (Adequacy) Have baselines been well maintained and effective change management processes operated? (Adequacy) Is there a document that shows which organisational unit is responsiblc for which work items?

Only two practices failed to show significance at the 95% level or better:-

Towam's Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 5 Q3

Is there a process for selecting key risks based on probability and impact? (Maturity) and

Q29

Has the integrity of the performance measurement baseline been maintained? (Maturity)

The assumption behind the one-way ANOVA test is that the distribution of values for each variable is normal, and this is not necessarily the case in the answers to some of these questions. To allow for this, a second test was carried out - the Kruskal-Wallis test - which is a non-parametric alternative to the one-way ANOVA. The results of this test are also included in the table in Appendix P-8. They showed that questions could be raised about how much confidence can be placed in the conclusions concerning three of the variables - Q2, Q3, and Q12. On the other hand, they indicated a confidence level of greater than 99% for questions 5 and 3 1.

5.4.5

Conclusions about effective practices

The question being asked in this analysis was, "What project management practices, if any, can be shown to have a measurable and predictable impact on project performance across a wide range of types of projects?"

A number of conclusions can be reached in answer to this question. Although there is a loose but significant relationship between time predictability and cost predictability, and a somewhat stronger one between scope predictability and time predictability, the traditional project manager's iron triangle of time, cost and scope are each influenced by different project management practices. Project management practices do not appear to have different effects whcn employed on different types of projects, in different industries or across the varying perspectives of in-house, supplier, procurer or prime contractor. Projects that cost more than f 100 million do not seem to be either more or less predictable as far as cost is concerned than projects that cost less than £1 million, or anywhere in between. Projects lasticg longer than 3 years, however, seem to bc significantly less prcdictable in tcrms of both time and scope than projects of a shorter duration.

Towards lmproved Project Management Practice: Chapter 5 Project duration is less predictable than either project scope or cost, and it's predictability is significantly affected by a number of practices, including the: o Adequacy of company-wide education on the concepts of risk management. o Maturity of an organisation's processes for assigning ownership of risks. o Adequacy with which a visible risk register is maintained. o Adequacy of an up-to-date risk management plan. o Adequacy of documentation of organisational rcsponsibilitics on the project. There is also some evidence, at least for the set of projects in this analysis, that tinie predictability is probably affected by the: o Adequacy and maturity of processes for identifying and quantifying risks. o Adequacy of communication about risk status throughout the project's life. o Maturity of the process for maintaining effective baseline control and change control. There is also some evidence, at least for the set of projects in this analysis, that cost predictability is influenced by the maturity of the scope change control proccss. For projects undertaken by organisations with a mature scope change control process, the adequacy of providing the right level of information to the right level of authority (thereby enabling effective governance) makes a significant difference. The differences in time predictability between those projects employing these practices adequately, and those not doing so can be as much as 40% (from being on schedule to being 40% late). The differences in cost predictability between those projects employing these practices adequately, and those not doing so, can be as much as 23% (from 4.5% under budget, to 18% over budget).

Towards lmproved Project Management Practice: Chapter 5

A "relative" spin-off from a "positivist" search for effective practices

5.4.6

The aim of this section was not to illustrate "relative" practices, but rather to operate within an "imperfect" epistemological procedure employing more quantitative techniques. Nevertheless, there are relative spin-offs to members participating in this study. 3.0

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Figure 47: Compari.~on uf relative cost Rr limeprediclability l ~ company. y

Figure 47 shows how the projects submitted by each company vary in tcrms of the cost and timc prcdictability. The sample of 136 projects was selected by organisations without clear criteria being set for their inclusion in the sample, so there is no inherent justification to generalise about the performance of this set of projects compared to a "typical" data set (whatever that might mean). On the other hand, thc projects were all actual projects carried out by the 23 organisations that submitted them, using the actual project management practices that these organisations employ. There is thus no reason to suppose that the influence of proiect managerncnt practices on the performance of the

Towanls Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 5

projects is any different from that for any set of projects managed by organisations like those that contributed projects to the sample. The fact that member organisations are paying to belong to the programme for the purposes of learning about what project management practices lead to improved project performance, and are continuing to seek to improve their project management practices using the results obtained by the multiple methods in use within the networks, suggests that they themselves have no interest in presenting unrepresentative data. Clearly, if thesc projects are typical of their whole portfolio. the senior management of companies C and F will have had rathcr more pleasant surprises than the management teams of companies H or R. (Company X is an amalgamation of all companies that submitted fewer than five valid projects, since a boxplot is meaningful only if it contains more than five values). Since data on individual practices is also available, this perfomlance measure can be compared on a company-by-company basis with scores for a range of project management practices. Figure 48 shows the intercompany comparison for risk management practices, that have already been shown to have a significant cffcct on time predictability.

Towards Improved Project Managernenf Practice: Chapter 5

Company

Figure 48: Variubilil?,of Mean Risk Management Adequacy behveen

In comparing company pcrformance in figure 47, it is reasonable to attribute at least some of the performance of companies F and H to their risk management, and so company H is in a position to estimate thc improvement in time predictability (approximately 30%) that might rcsult from improving their mean risk management from "partly adequate" to "largely adequate". They are thus better placed to assess the likely return on investment of a programme to improve risk management across the company.

This Chapter has reviewed the results obtained from thc analysis of data in the two largest sets of data that have so far been assembled during the research. A "relative" study, co~iibining quantitative metrics with qualitative analysis of descriptions of the practices themselves has enabled member organisations to identify their own strengths and

Towards Improved Project Management Practice: Chapter 5 weaknesses relative to other companies, has provided substantial input into the description of a project manager's worldview that was developed in Chapter 2. and has provided the impetus for deciding what topics should be studied in further depth in workshops and by working parties. The insights provided by this "qualitative" work also fed into the developmcnt of the more "quantitative" of the two sets of data. illustrating how the different elements of the niethodology, each employing different research methods, complement and "feed" each other. At this point it is possible to provide answers to questions 4 and 5 ofthe six research questions first listed in section 1.6.

44

What evidence is there from actual project outcomes that the "benchmark" practices translate into actual project performance? The research denionstmted that project perforniance cart he measured in different ujajrs, and tlie perfornzance measrrrrv used tltroiighout this reyearch have been actual project restrlh compared with the results that were forecmt at the tinie project plans were ou thorised. Intlividi{al project />e~:fornitmc:e varies widely ,from project to project, but ~~otterns can be discerned that differentiate cohorts of projects sharing spec$c practices. Coinpared to a niean per,$>rmanceof 1376 Inte and 3% over hzcdget, the difference 6ellt~eencohorts of'j~rojecls dentonstrating good and bad project management practice varied from Iwing 40% lnte to being 6?6 early, nnd,firn heirig 18% over budget to being 4K9S under budget. This constitirtes convincing evidence that good project management practices translate into actual improved project petjbrmance..

Q5

In the light of project performance, which practices andlor processes can be demonstrated to have a determinative influence on project performance? The research demonstrated that the prnctices that deterritirte schedule performance differ ,fi.orn those that nffect cost pet,forniance and from those that qflecf scope perfbrn~ance. A rnnge of specific risk nianagement practices has the grt.ntest afect on project tinie pretlictabili